


a sky full of stars

by nightswatch



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Summer Camp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-06
Updated: 2015-07-19
Packaged: 2018-04-03 04:57:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 24,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4087783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightswatch/pseuds/nightswatch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire gets roped into helping out at a summer camp and isn't too happy when he learns that Enjolras is one of the camp counselors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've never been a camp counselor - actually I've only been to a super tiny summer camp once when I was a kid - so there are probably going to be some inaccuracies. Sorry about that.

“Grantaire!”

Grantaire, not really expecting anyone to very loudly call his name inside the library, nearly fell off his chair. He might have been about to fall asleep as well, because he was exhausted and not really sure where his motivation had fucked off to. He was one of the poor souls who hadn’t yet finished all of their assignments and had to spend the last few days before summer break digging through books.

He looked around and found Courfeyrac walking over to his table, a sheepish grin on his face. “Grantaire,” he whispered and slid into the empty seat next to him.

“Courfeyrac,” Grantaire said lowly. Not that the volume of his voice mattered. Everyone who was still at the library was probably dead inside anyway. “What’s up?”

“Well, I’m glad you asked,” Courfeyrac said, beaming at him. “Because earlier I was thinking, you work at the coffee cart right?”

Grantaire frowned. “Right. You’re not getting free coffee.”

“That’s disappointing, but also not what I was getting at. The coffee cart isn’t there over summer break.”

“I know,” Grantaire said. And he still had no idea what this was about. “If you’re worried that you won’t be getting enough coffee, I can write you a list of really great places that sell much better coffee than we do at that cart.”

“I appreciate that you’re willing to make that kind of effort,” Courfeyrac said and patted him on the back. “But I was actually wondering if you had plans for the summer. Are you going home?”

“Definitely not,” Grantaire said and maybe it sounded bitter and maybe he really didn’t like the face Courfeyrac was making, but he just shrugged it off. “I like it better here anyway.”

Courfeyrac hummed. “And do you have a summer job or anything?”

“I’ve been looking into finding one,” Grantaire muttered. Which basically meant that he’d conducted a half-assed google search before he’d given up on it. And now it was probably too late to find anything decent.

“I see,” Courfeyrac said, nodding slowly, “well, if you’re still looking for something, I might have an offer for you.”

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “What kind of offer?” To be honest, he was a bit suspicious. Courfeyrac’s ideas, even though always well-intended, tended to be rather questionable sometimes.

“Well, you know Cosette, right?”

Grantaire nodded. Well, that was a good start. Cosette was basically a precious angel, who deserved all the good things in the world and who thought that exact same thing about everyone else, so what followed probably wasn’t going to be completely ridiculous or, well, questionable.

“Well, then I guess you also know about her dad?”

This time Grantaire snorted. He’d at least heard part of the story. Apparently he’d been in prison long before he’d adopted Cosette. He’d made a name for himself with his charity organization over the years and even though Grantaire wasn’t quite sure what exactly they were doing there – really, they seemed to have tons of projects going on – he did know that Valjean was some kind of local hero now. And because he was some kind of local hero and he’d also never made a secret out of his past, it hadn’t been exactly hard for their friend Marius to find out that the girl he was in love with was the daughter of an ex-convict.

He’d been a little bit terrified. Grantaire had found it immensely entertaining – even though it had been in the middle of a meeting and Enjolras had kept shooting him _Grantaire, can’t you be serious for a second_ looks, followed by _no, Grantaire, stop asking him questions right now_ looks.

Anyway, yes, Grantaire knew what Courfeyrac was on about.

“Well,” Courfeyrac said, “he always organizes a couple of summer camps every year. It’s mainly for kids of single moms and dads who don’t have anyone to look after their kids or don’t have enough money to pay for a babysitter or whatever. And he’s looking for a few more last minute volunteers for this year. Apparently there’ve been a couple of complications.”

“So you want me to do what exactly?”

“Well, you want to be an art teacher, right? So why don’t you teach them some art?” Courfeyrac smiled. “Or, you know, you could always be a counselor.”

Grantaire hummed. Being an art teacher wasn’t Plan A. Not that he didn’t love kids, but it wasn’t what he’d always imagined he’d be doing. But it was certainly going to pay better than trying to sell enough art to make a living. Anyway, Courfeyrac wasn’t wrong, but there had to be a catch. “It’s unpaid, isn’t it?”

“But it’ll look excellent on your resume,” Courfeyrac said happily. “Listen, I’ll send you an email with all the details and if you decide that you like it, you can get in touch with Valjean. I’m sure that he’d be glad to have you on board. Because we really need someone to man that arts and craft table with Feuilly.”

“Yeah, I’ll think about it.”

“Don’t think about it for too long,” Courfeyrac said. “We have our first meeting next Friday and camp starts two weeks from now. Here…” He took one of Grantaire’s pens and scribbled down an email address on his notepad. “If you’re interested, let Valjean know. He’ll need some stuff from you and he’ll probably do a background check on you, but I’m sure he’ll be happy that there’s someone who’s willing to help out on such short notice.”

“Okay,” Grantaire only said. He might not get any money for it, but Courfeyrac was right, it would look pretty good on his resume.

“I’d also be really happy if you were willing to do it,” Courfeyrac went on, “because that would mean that I’m not going to disappoint Valjean. Believe me, that man has a horrible I’m-so-disappointed face. It makes me cry. It makes the children cry.”

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “Did you already tell him that I’d do it?” Because Courfeyrac had this problem where he wanted everyone to be happy and Grantaire called it a problem because Courfeyrac occasionally made promises that he ended up having a hard time keeping.

“No, I wouldn’t do that, come on,” Courfeyrac said. He paused and bit his lip. “I only told him that I might know someone who could help us out, especially with the arts and crafts thing. Because those kids really love pasta necklaces and friendship bracelets and painting all kinds of stuff, you know? And they want to do it all at the same time and Feuilly could really use some help.”

“Right, I’ll finish this,” Grantaire said and pointed at the stack of books next to him, “and then I can think about talking to Valjean.”

“Have I ever told you how great you are?”

Grantaire rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right, just don’t… I said I’d _think_ about it.”

“I know,” Courfeyrac said and ruffled his hair before he eventually left him be.

* * *

Grantaire didn’t actually need a lot of time to think about whether or not he was going to contact Valjean. There was a reason that all of his friends volunteered for Valjean – no, not just because he was Cosette’s dad. A recommendation from Valjean was pretty much the best thing that could happen to anyone.

And working at camp was going to be fun. At least more fun than finding some shit-ass summer job that he undoubtedly was going to hate. He’d got some money from his grandparents that was going to get him through the summer and once classes started again in the fall, he’d go back to working at the coffee cart.

So he emailed Valjean the next morning, included a couple of references, even though he’d only done volunteer work once when he’d painted a mural with the kids at the community center down the street from college – Feuilly had dragged him into that one. He also made sure to mention that Courfeyrac had told him about a last minute opening at the camp and received a call from Valjean’s secretary no more than thirty minutes later, asking him if he could swing by the office in the afternoon.

Valjean seemed to be delighted to have him – and not nowhere near as scary as Marius had them all believe – and talked to him about some of his experiences with kids, which really weren’t a lot, since he just looked after his niece every now and then and also Gavroche whenever Eponine couldn’t get a babysitter for whatever reason. They talked a little about art, about Grantaire’s hobbies, about the mural, and Valjean had then promised to send him an email with all the details. He must have really needed someone to help out. Honestly, Grantaire was pretty sure that he’d never got a job so quickly. Although Valjean was also known for giving all kinds of people a chance, so maybe Grantaire shouldn’t be surprised.

Later that day he did receive an email from Valjean, welcoming him to the camp family. There were a couple of attachments – a list of important dates, of meetings that he’d have to show up at before camp started, a list of things that he’d be provided with at the camp and what he’d need to bring himself, a list of phone numbers of people in charge, of the other volunteers. And that was where Grantaire froze. Because way up on that list, between a bunch of familiar names, like Combeferre and Courfeyrac, was also Enjolras.

Grantaire huffed. _Of course_.

He reached for his phone and dialed Courfeyrac’s number. “You didn’t tell me that Enjolras was going to be there, too,” Grantaire said as soon as Courfeyrac had picked up.

“You got the job,” Courfeyrac squealed. “Congrats, Grantaire!”

“Yeah, thanks,” Grantaire said, rolling his eyes at nothing in particular. “So, Enjolras?”

“Enjolras has been volunteering for Valjean for ages,” Courfeyrac said very slowly. “And I assumed you knew?”

“Did you really,” Grantaire said dryly. “Or did you know that I wouldn’t have applied for that job if I’d known that Enjolras would be working at camp, too?”

“Aw, come on.” Courfeyrac laughed. “You’ll probably hardly see him.”

“He’s head counselor, of course I’ll see him.”

“Yeah, okay, maybe you’ll see him all the fucking time, but it’s not a big deal.”

Grantaire groaned. “Did you forget about _the thing_ that happened at your birthday party?”

“No, I did not forget about the thing, but–”

“Did Enjolras forget about the thing?”

“Probably not, but–”

“Then it is a big deal,” Grantaire said. He’d spend every second since Courfeyrac’s party dying of embarrassment, it would be terrible and Grantaire was already regretting this so much.

“If you could listen to me for one second,” Courfeyrac said, but didn’t go on and only made a strangled noise.

“What?”

Courfeyrac whined. “Combeferre just walked past my room,” Courfeyrac whispered, “he was _shirtless_.”

“How tragic,” Grantaire only said.

“How about you show some compassion,” Courfeyrac said. He sniffled. “What if the guy you have a massive crush on kept walking past you shirtless, huh? You’d cry, too.”

“You’re not actually crying.”

“But I want to.”

“Well, what if you’d told the guy you have a massive crush on that you love him when you were too drunk to stop yourself?” Grantaire asked. “And what if you had to see him every day all summer long?”

“Yes, I was getting to that before we were so rudely interrupted,” Courfeyrac said. “I investigated, just out of curiosity. Enjolras actually thinks that you were, quote, _just drunk_ and that you were _really nice to everyone_ that night. Apparently you were hugging everyone. And you kissed Jehan. I’d confirm this, but I don’t even remember arriving at the party. Although Enjolras said you told him you _liked_ him not that you _loved_ him.”

“Whatever, it’s equally embarrassing.” Grantaire sighed. “So he thinks that I just told him that I like him because I was drunk and not because I actually like him?”

“Basically, yeah.”

“Okay,” Grantaire said, nodding to himself, “that’s actually good news. That means I can look at him again without wanting to bury myself in the cold hard ground.”

“Yeah, Taylor Swift, looks like your love confession wasn’t actually considered to be one.”

Grantaire hummed. So he’d been avoiding Enjolras for no reason for the past couple of weeks. Enjolras probably hadn’t even noticed, though.

“So, this is good news, yeah?”

“Of course,” Grantaire said. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“You don’t want to tell him that you like him?”

“Do you want to tell Combeferre that you like him?”

“That’s totally different,” Courfeyrac protested. “I know that my feelings will not be reciprocated, but you actually have a chance.”

“I really don’t,” Grantaire said. And he’d accepted that. He still couldn’t really explain why he’d suddenly felt the need to tell Enjolras – he did get slightly more affectionate when he was drunk, but that mostly showed itself in him falling asleep on other people’s shoulders and not spontaneous love confessions.

“I still think you should give it another try.”

“Nope,” Grantaire said firmly, “not happening.”

“You disappoint me,” Courfeyrac said with a sigh. “Well, we’re having dinner in a bit. Let’s hope that Combeferre has found a shirt, otherwise I won’t be able to concentrate on eating my food, just on eating–”

“Okay, yeah, I get it, prayer circle for shirts and all that.”

“Thank you, friend, whatever would I do without you,” Courfeyrac cooed. “Let’s hang out this weekend, okay?”

“Okay, I’ll text you.”

“Cool. And, believe me, it’s really not gonna be that bad. I promise.”

Grantaire was somehow still regretting every decision that had led to him having to work with Enjolras for four weeks.

* * *

“Grantaire, over here!”

Grantaire found Courfeyrac and Bossuet both waving at him frantically. He laughed and pushed past a group of girls to join his friends.

“Here, we saved you a seat,” Bossuet said and patted on the empty chair next to him.

“You and everyone else we know,” Courfeyrac said and nodded at the empty row of chairs.

“There are tons of new people this year,” Bossuet mused.

Grantaire looked around the room. He wouldn’t even be able to tell whether or not someone was new – actually he was just trying to find out if Enjolras was here already. Grantaire didn’t see him anywhere so he turned back to Bossuet and Courfeyrac. “So, what’s happening here today?”

“Mainly a lot of talking,” Bossuet said with a shrug.

“Yeah, camp rules, planned activities, stuff like that,” Courfeyrac said, “and there’ll also be free coffee and donuts at the end.”

Well, that was at least something to look forward to. The room quickly filled up, Joly joined them together with Musichetta, Jehan slid into the seat next to Grantaire, Bahorel and Feuilly came over to them, and eventually Combeferre and Enjolras came walking in. Only Combeferre joined them, though. Enjolras hovered by the door – “Enjolras is waiting for Valjean,” Combeferre said as he sat down, and okay, that explained it.

Grantaire tried not to stare too obviously, or at least he liked to think that he didn’t, but Enjolras noticed eventually. It was too late for Grantaire to pretend that he’d just been looking around the room, but, much to his surprise, Enjolras actually smiled at him. Grantaire quickly nodded at him and then turned around only to find that Courfeyrac was engaged into a conversation with Marius across the room in what looked vaguely like sign language. Or at least what Marius was doing looked like sign language. Courfeyrac was only waving his arms around.

“I have no idea what he’s saying,” Courfeyrac said through his teeth, still smiling at Marius.

“Why don’t you just go over there and talk to him?”

“Because he’s teaching me sign language,” Courfeyrac said. “The problem is that so far this conversation is pretty one-sided.”

“You’ll get there,” Jehan said and patted his arm, “it took me ages to get the hang of Ancient Greek.”

“Thank you, that’s so encouraging,” Courfeyrac said and just shrugged in Marius’ direction.

“So,” Grantaire asked, looking around the room, “all these people are volunteers?”

“Yeah, basically. I mean the camp is for kids whose parents have to work over the summer and can’t afford childcare while the kids aren’t at school, so obviously they don’t pay for it. Valjean has tons of backers as far as I know, but yeah, most people who work there are volunteers.”

Grantaire elbowed Courfeyrac in the ribs. “And what do you do?”

“I do dancing workshops. But Enjolras is gonna talk about all of that in a bit anyway. Seriously, it’s gonna be so great and–”

“Good afternoon, everyone,” Enjolras said loudly and a hush fell over the room, everyone quickly sliding into empty seats.

“And I really can’t wait for the–”

“If I could have everyone’s attention, please.” Enjolras smiled at Courfeyrac when he’d stopped talking. “Thank you.”

Valjean joined him in the front of the room. “I’d like to thank everyone for coming. I’m glad to see so many familiar faces, because that means that you had a good time the previous year, which our new volunteers will be happy to hear. Sadly, I can’t be here with you today for this meeting, but Enjolras here is going to give you a quick introduction in my place. Thank you all again for volunteering and I’ll see you at orientation days next week.”

Once the round of applause for Valjean had died down, Enjolras turned on the projector, which then showed the first slide of a power point presentation. Grantaire only barely suppressed a snort. Grantaire occasionally made fun of Enjolras’ ridiculously elaborate presentations – they had sound effects and everything. And maybe he also admired his dedication. Grantaire had only made a presentation once in his entire student career and it had had a total of two slides.

Enjolras was going over camp rules, activity areas and special events. “We’re going to have a water war,” Enjolras said, at which Courfeyrac excitedly grabbed Grantaire’s hand, “we’re also going to do a night hike and we’re going to have bonfires every now and then, depending on the weather.” The list of activities was long, although not quite as long as the list of rules. Grantaire was already mourning the temporary loss of his weekly visits to the Corinthe with Joly and Bossuet, although at least he wouldn’t have to spend the summer without them.

“I’ll send around another email with more information and some tips for our new volunteers later today,” Enjolras was saying, briefly glancing in Grantaire’s direction. Enjolras probably thought that Grantaire was going to fuck up tremendously. There was a good chance that he was right. Because even though Grantaire was usually pretty good with kids, he wasn’t sure if he was going to be good with kids for four weeks in a row without much of a break.

Well, he wasn’t going to be alone in it. And he wasn’t a counselor, so he pretty much only had to stick to his area of expertise.

Enjolras ended the meeting then and before long Grantaire was munching a donut. And waiting as Enjolras very slowly made his way over to them. And for some reason he came to a halt right next to Grantaire.

“Nice power point,” Grantaire said with a wink. Which was basically the first thing he’d said to him ever since he’d told him how much he liked him three weeks ago.

Enjolras pursed his lips. “Thank you,” he said. “Do you have any questions?”

“No, I think I’m good.” Actually he’d been at band camp once, so he at least sort of knew what he was in for. “Thanks, though.”

“Just let me know if anything comes up,” Enjolras said.

“Yeah, I just need to figure out how to get to the camp, but I guess there’s a train station somewhere around there, right?”

Enjolras stared at him for a long moment as if Grantaire wasn’t making any sense at all. “Why are you going by train?”

“Because I don’t have a car?”

“I’m pretty sure that someone can give you a ride,” Feuilly said. “My car is full, but we’ll find someone else, don’t worry about it.”

“You could come with me,” Enjolras said with a shrug.

“Wait a second,” Courfeyrac said, “he can come with you but I can’t?”

“You’re going with Combeferre.”

“Yeah, but just because you apparently have so much stuff in your car that there’s no space for tiny little Courfeyrac.”

“You mean tiny little Courfeyrac and his massive suitcase,” Enjolras said.

“My suitcase is not massive,” Courfeyrac said, wearing the fakest pout of all time.

Enjolras shook his head at him and then turned back to Grantaire. “I’m sure I’ll be able to make space for you,” he said, “and I’m sure that Courfeyrac won’t mind going with Combeferre at all. I’ll let you know when I’ll pick you up.”

“Okay, thanks.” So he’d also have to figure out how to survive a 45-minute car ride with Enjolras. Preferably without starting a fight. He bit into his donut with a sigh.

And Enjolras was still standing right next to him, but not saying a word and Grantaire was starting to get a little nervous. Especially because Enjolras kept looking at him.

Eventually Enjolras cleared his throat. “There’s frosting on your nose,” he whispered and then quickly walked off to talk to Combeferre.


	2. Chapter 2

Enjolras was early. _Of course_ he was early. He’d probably never been late to anything in his entire life. And, okay, it was just ten minutes, but Grantaire had needed those ten minutes to put on socks and a shirt and to make coffee and eat the one apple that he had left. He’d made sure that there wasn’t any food that could go bad while he was away, but now he was regretting that he hadn’t at least made sure that there would be something more nourishing than an apple.

First he had to open the door for Enjolras, though. Grantaire yanked open the door and pulled his shirt over his head in the same motion. “I’ll be ready in a second.”

“No worries,” Enjolras said. He didn’t come inside, just remained standing in the doorway, watching as Grantaire stumbled about his shoebox of an apartment, pulling on socks and shoes and grabbing his apple.

No coffee for him today, but Grantaire had survived worse. “See, I’m ready, let’s go.”

“How about I take this,” Enjolras said and took the apple from him, “so you can get your bag.”

“Right, my bag.” He’d almost forgotten all about that. In his defense, it was pretty easy to forget about stuff when Enjolras was watching you. Because even early in the morning, Enjolras’ glance was as focused and piercing as ever.

Grantaire picked up all of his stuff, took a last look around to make sure all the windows were closed and all the lights were switched off and even remembered to lock the door. Enjolras had parked as close to his building as he’d been able to and had squeezed his car into the tiniest parking space.

“I made some space for you on the backseat,” Enjolras said as he opened the door for him. There wasn’t that much space for Grantaire’s bag, actually. Enjolras’ car was full of boxes, big and small ones.

“Holy shit,” Grantaire said and really only barely managed to squeeze his travel bag in there. It was a good thing that he’d decided against bringing his suitcase.

Grantaire sat down in the passenger seat and earned an annoyed look from Enjolras when he didn’t immediately put on his seatbelt. It was amazing how clean Enjolras’ car was – well, except for the flyers, and the mix CDs – probably gifts from Courfeyrac – and the massive bound roadmap that apparently included maps for all of Europe.

“Combeferre gave it to me,” Enjolras said when he’d undoubtedly noticed Grantaire staring. “In case I get lost and my GPS stops working. He really has too much faith in my ability to read maps.” He started the car and pointed down the street. “There’s a coffee shop down there, right? Do you mind if I stop there to get some coffee?”

Enjolras didn’t look like he needed any coffee, really, he looked like he’d got a good night’s sleep and wasn’t at all feeling like a zombie – unlike Grantaire. But Enjolras probably knew that Grantaire hadn’t had time to eat anything, so, as strange as it seemed to him, maybe Enjolras was just being nice and wanted to give him an opportunity to have breakfast. Whatever it was, Grantaire sure as hell wasn’t going to complain. “Yeah, that’s fine,” he said as if he didn’t care at all, when actually every single cell in his body was screaming for coffee.

And going by the twitch of Enjolras’ lips he knew just as well as Grantaire did.

Grantaire ended up quickly running into the coffee shop to get coffee for the both of them and a breakfast sandwich for himself. He could only hope that Enjolras wasn’t going to give him shit for wanting to eat it in his car.

“What’s that?” Enjolras asked once Grantiare was back in the car, nodding at the paper bag he was carrying.

“It’s a sandwich,” Grantaire replied and handed over the coffee. “Is your car a food free zone?”

“Yeah, I suppose you’ll have to eat that with your head sticking out the window,” Enjolras said, staying serious for about a second before he smiled. “No, it’s fine, go ahead.”

Grantaire nodded, not sure if he’d somehow ended up in a parallel universe where Enjolras was cracking jokes and smiling at him. Because Enjolras didn’t smile at Grantaire, not ever.

Grantaire, still confused, practically inhaled his sandwich. To be honest, this _driving to the camp with Enjolras_ thing was going a lot better than expected and Grantaire wasn’t sure if this wasn’t too good to last. He was sort of expecting that Enjolras was going to ask him about his drunk slip-up and that would basically make each and every one of Grantaire’s nightmares come true at once.

“So,” Enjolras said after a while, and yeah, okay, that was probably it.

Grantaire took a deep breath. “Yeah?”

“Have you ever been to a camp before?”

“I...” For a second Grantaire wasn’t even sure what to say for a moment. He just hadn’t been expecting small talk. “No,” he said eventually, “well, band camp. But only once. I usually went to my grandparents’ place over the summer.”

“I see,” Enjolras said. “That sounds nice.”

“Yeah, it was alright,” Grantaire mumbled. He’d always been bad at talking to Enjolras and it seemed that Enjolras was also bad at talking to him, because after that he fell silent again, fingers tapping on the steering wheel.

Enjolras switched from radio to one of Courfeyrac’s super duper awesome road trip CDs – or at least that was what the handwritten CD cover made it out to be. Enjolras’ fingers were still tapping, completely out of rhythm. “You know,” Enjolras said after a while, “if you have any questions, about the camp or any of the proceedings... I mean, I’m sure Valjean has sent you all the necessary information, and you were there for the meeting, but–”

“Don’t worry,” Grantaire said, rolling his eyes “I’ll do my best not to fuck up.” Well, okay, he’d also been expecting that one, in a way. Because Enjolras knew how many times he’d already gloriously fucked up on a multitude of occasions, so it wasn’t surprising that he didn’t have too much faith in him.

“I wasn’t trying to insinuate that I think you’re going to fuck up.” Enjolras sighed. “I just wanted you to know that if you have any questions, you can ask me.”

“Okay, fine,” Grantaire said. “Thanks, I guess.”

“You’re welcome,” Enjolras muttered. He sounded vaguely pissed off now. That hadn’t taken long.

* * *

“Weren’t we supposed to get here at nine?” Grantaire asked as he climbed out of the passenger seat. “I’m pretty sure that’s what it said in Valjean’s email. Nine o’clock. It’s not nine o’clock.”

“Well, we’re a little early,” Enjolras said with a shrug.

“We’re forty-five minutes early,” Grantaire grumbled, “that’s a whole other level of early.”

“I just wanted to make sure that we got here on time. Which we did. You never know what traffic is going to be like and I wasn’t sure how quickly we could leave from your place.”

“What, you thought I wouldn’t be ready on time?”

Enjolras pursed his lips. “You weren’t.”

“Because you were ten minutes early,” Grantaire said and pulled his bag out of the car. “Whatever, we’re here now, it’s fine.” He really didn’t want to start a fight, there were too many convenient places for Enjolras to get rid of his body. Maybe in the lake, or somewhere between the trees.

To be honest, the camp looked really nice. There were a bunch of wooden cabins, a playground, the lake with a big slide and a couple of boats, a wide open field and Grantaire could spy something that looked like a volleyball court behind the trees.

“It’s lovely, isn’t it?” Enjolras asked.

Grantaire hummed, because yes, it was, but he also wasn’t in the mood to outright agree with Enjolras right now.

“Valjean bought it three years ago,” Enjolras went on. “The camp was already here, but the owners thought it was getting too small and wouldn’t appeal to kids, because it wasn’t exciting enough.” He made the face that he usually reserved for people who dared to question any of his ideas, that is Grantaire, he reserved that face solely for Grantaire. “They went looking for a different location. It works fine for us, though.”

“Yeah, that playground looks pretty rad,” Grantaire said, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. He was really, sincerely hoping that at least some of their friends were going to be early, too. “So, what now?”

Enjolras pulled a set of keys out of his backpack. “Well, you could help me carry all those boxes over to the main building.”

Much to Grantaire’s dismay, carrying the boxes over to the main building didn’t even take ten minutes and soon enough they were sitting on the front steps, Grantaire kinda wishing that he’d brought cigarettes, even though he knew that this was the last place he should bring anything of the sort. He’d known that when he’d signed up for working at a camp and now he had to live with it.

“So what’s the plan for orientation weekend?” Grantaire said, just for the sake of saying something.

“Didn’t you get the email?” Enjolras asked with a frown.

“I did,” Grantaire said, “I just didn’t know what else to say, to be honest.”

The corner of Enjolras’ mouth gave a twitch. “Well, when everyone’s here I’ll take them to their cabins, then everyone gets time to settle in, afterwards we’re making lunch together, we’ll have a tour, then some more time off and a bonfire in the evening,” Enjolras rattled off. “And tomorrow after breakfast we’re going to set up, hand out supplies, and I’m going to talk to everyone individually to make sure everyone’s good to go for Monday when the kids arrive.” He took a deep breath. “I also have to remember to hand out the camp rules to everyone and to go over the schedule of the special activities.”

Grantaire fought the urge to tell Enjolras to chill, because that seriously wouldn’t go well, but the poor guy was definitely stressed – and hiding it really well. “That’s, yeah, okay. Sounds like a good plan.” Grantaire bit his lip. “So are you basically in charge of this whole thing?”

“Valjean is going to come by tomorrow to make sure everything is going well. And he’ll be around every now and then, but there are a three more camps and he also has other business to attend to, so when he’s not here I’m in charge, yes.” Enjolras wound the end of his ponytail around his finger. “The last couple of years someone else was in charge, but she moved away, so now it’s my turn, I suppose.”

“Are you nervous?” Grantaire asked, even though it was pretty obvious by now.

“A little,” Enjolras mumbled. “Nothing has gone wrong so far. Well, nothing except for scraped knees and a few cases of too-much-candy, so I’m hoping it won’t be any different this year.”

“I’m sure everything’s going to be fine,” Grantaire said.

“You’re not usually so...” Enjolras trailed off when another car pulled up next to the main building. “Ah, I think that’s Bahorel and Feuilly.”

Grantaire wasn’t sure if he was glad that it wasn’t just the two of them anymore of if he would have rather heard the rest of that sentence.

* * *

“This is going to be so much fun,” Jehan said happily. He poked Grantaire in the ribs as he squeezed past him to claim the bed in the corner.

Grantaire was actually inclined to agree. Well, at least he had no reason to complain about the people he was going to share a cabin with for the next four weeks. Bahorel and Feuilly were currently bickering about who was going to take the leftover bed by the door – those were pretty unpopular for some reason and Grantaire had made the mistake of dumping his belongings onto the first bed available. Courfeyrac had made himself comfortable on his own bed in the middle and Jehan was already starting to unpack.

The cabins, well, or at least their cabin, was pretty cozy. There wasn’t too much space, just enough for their five beds, nightstands a couple of shelves for their stuff and a pin board that was currently empty except for a printout of the camp rules.

“How much time do I have to take a nap?” Courfeyrac asked lowly.

“Maybe you should put the bedsheets on your bed beforehand,” Feuilly suggested.

Courfeyrac grumbled something unintelligible, but smiled when Jehan draped his flowery raincape over him. “I wanted to sleep on the drive here,” Courfeyrac said and let out a deep sigh.

“But you were too busy staring at Combeferre?” Bahorel guessed.

“No, there was just a... minor hiccup,” Courfeyrac mumbled.

“What happened?”

“I thought I knew a shortcut,” Courfeyrac said, smirking. “I was wrong.”

Feuilly snorted. “Poor Combeferre.”

“Really, I’m the one you should feel bad for.” Courfeyrac hid his face behind his hands. “Have you seen Combeferre’s shirt? It’s a tiny little bit see-through and I still haven’t fully recovered.”

“Just you wait until he jumps into the lake for the first time,” Bahorel said cheerfully, at which Courfeyrac let out a whine and pulled Jehan’s rain cape over his head.

Jehan nodded. “Yep, this is going to be the best year yet.”

Grantaire snorted. Well, he did feel a little bad for Courfeyrac. Not that Courfeyrac had confessed his love to Combeferre or anything, but still, everyone knew. They obviously all kept their mouths shut around Combeferre, but Grantaire had a feeling that Combeferre knew as well, because he was one of the most perceptive people Grantaire knew. He couldn’t possibly miss the heart-eyes that Courfeyrac was making at him at any given moment and was probably really just waiting for Courfeyrac to get his shit together and say something.

Well, Grantaire certainly wasn’t going to get involved. It was none of his business and he had his own problems to deal with.

Enjolras seemed to have got over his initial nervousness – he was busy handing out nametags and camp shirts and folders to everyone to make sure everyone had a copy of the camp rules, a map of the grounds and a schedule for the upcoming weeks and then invited them all to gather in the main building so they could all cook lunch together. Musichetta was in charge of the kitchen staff, which really wasn’t surprising to Grantaire, since she also helped out at one of Valjean’s soup kitchens and was basically the best cook Grantaire knew.

“The kids usually help out too,” Musichetta explained as she handed Grantaire a few more tomatoes to cut up. “It’s adorable how many of them volunteer.”

“Enjolras doesn’t seem too eager, though,” Grantaire mused. Enjolras was setting the table together with Bossuet, who Grantaire knew was an abysmal cook.

“Yeah, I’d rather have him out there than in here burning my food.”

Grantaire laughed. “Good point.”

Over lunch Grantaire talked to some of the other new volunteers, then Enjolras took them a tour around the grounds, to the playground, the lake, to the volleyball and basketball fields, and showed them where they were going to set up various activities.

“We’ll keep an eye on weather reports,” Enjolras was saying, “because we have tents we can set up in case it’s starting to rain. We also have a lot of activities for inside in case the rain gets too heavy, but we’re hoping that we’ll be able to spend as much time as possible outside.”

Enjolras also showed them to the cabin with the showers and the washing machines, the administration cabin with the main office and the nurses’ station right across from the main building with the dining hall. They also had a little library there and a huge shelf with board games and another one with toys.

They then had some more time off that Grantaire spent playing a volleyball match with some of his friends. Grantaire caught a glimpse of Enjolras hurrying about the grounds every now and again but didn’t end up actually talking to him until later on when they all gathered to have a bonfire. They were going to grill vegetables and sausages and Grantaire had also seen Musichetta carry two huge bags of marshmallows.

“How do you like it so far?” Enjolras asked as he sat down next to Grantaire. Why he’d chosen to sit down next to him of all people was a mystery to Grantaire.

“It’s pretty cool, I seriously can’t wait to go on that playground,” Grantaire said.

Enjolras looked like he wasn’t sure whether to smile or to roll his eyes and ended up doing a little bit of both.

“Everything going well in the camp leader department?” Grantaire asked.

“So far, yes,” Enjolras replied and accepted a skewer with vegetables from Bahorel. “Do you want one, too?”

“Sure, yeah,” Grantaire muttered and pulled Bahorel a little further away from where Feuilly had just started the bonfire, because it seemed that Bahorel was paying a little too much attention to the food he was handing out and had forgotten that he was actually walking around a fire.

Grantaire was going to have to talk to Feuilly later on, because they hadn’t really made any plans for what they were going to do with the kids during the first week. Well, there probably was a plan that Feuilly had made with the person Grantaire was replacing. He knew that they were going to have a table where the kids could draw and he also knew that the kids would be able to make friendship bracelets – Feuilly had promised that he was going to take care of that since Grantaire didn’t have the slightest clue how to make them. Although he had looked it up on the internet and he was pretty sure that he could make a decent friendship bracelet now.

“Well,” Enjolras said, “if you need help with anything, let me know.” He stood up and cleared his throat. “Or Courfeyrac, he’s been volunteering just as long as I have. Which would make sense since you’re sleeping in the same cabin.” Enjolras nodded, more to himself than at Grantaire, and then went to talk to some of the other volunteers.

“Right,” Grantaire muttered. Maybe there was something really weird going on with Enjolras or maybe Grantaire was just being overdramatic or Enjolras was just trying to be nice to his minions, _all_ of his minions – or at least that’s what Grantaire thought they all were. Whatever it was, Grantaire thought it was strangely disconcerting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who left kudos and commented on the first chapter, you were all really sweet!


	3. Chapter 3

Grantaire shifted his weight from one foot to the other, lamenting the fact that he couldn’t just sit down on the grass like the kids. Making sure they all made it to the right cabin, making sure they all got settled in without wreaking havoc, answering their questions – all of that had taken up the better part of their Monday morning.

Now they’d all gathered on the field out in front of the main building, Valjean had welcomed the kids, had introduced all of the volunteers, and had then left to do the same thing again at one of his other camps. Now Enjolras was telling the kids about all the things they’d planned – the night hike, the bonfires, the water war, the movie nights – and then pointed out all the activities they could take part in on a daily basis.

Grantaire had set up the arts and craft table with Feuilly early, really incredibly early, this morning before the first kids had started to arrive. Someone had been taken to camp by their parents, some had come on the buses organized by Valjean. It had been a busy day so far and Grantaire was pretty sure that every day from now was going to be exactly the same. Although being kept busy was probably the best thing that could have happened to him.

Feuilly had already told him that the arts and crafts table was one of the most popular ones, especially on days when they had special activities planned. Today they’d only set up regular crayons and sharpies, since the kids weren’t going to come by their table until after lunch.

Grantaire let out a quiet sigh at the thought of lunch. They’d had a decent breakfast this morning, but right now it felt to Grantaire like it had been years ago and he could really only hope that Enjolras was going to stop talking about camp rules soon and send them all off to have lunch.

And it looked like he was going to be lucky because now Enjolras was telling the kids that after lunch they were all going to gather in groups with their respective camp counselors. And then, finally, Enjolras told them to get themselves lunch in the main building.

“Please tell me we’re having lunch too,” Grantaire whispered to Combeferre.

Combeferre laughed. “We are,” he said and gave him a pat on the back.

Grantaire followed everyone else into the main building, got himself a sandwich and joined everyone else at the table by the door. Enjolras had mentioned that they usually sat with the kids during lunch and dinner and that the counselors and activity leaders talked over breakfast, but things were a little different today.

Enjolras joined them a while later and sat down next to Courfeyrac. “Is everyone all set for this afternoon?” he asked.

There were a lot of affirmative mumbles and nods, which seemed to satisfy Enjolras, although Grantaire thought that he still looked a little nervous. He was stabbing at his salad more than he was eating it and kept looking around to see if the kids were all behaving well.

He really didn’t have to worry about the kids, though. They were loud, yes, but they were just laughing and talking all over each other. Most of them weren’t here for the first time anyway, there was just a handful of kids who were new this year, or at least that’s what Grantaire had been told. Well, he was new as well, so he couldn’t greet kids by their name like most of the others did because they knew them from the year before.

Well, Grantaire at least made an effort to remember most of the kids’ names. But there were a lot of them and for about an hour he kept thinking that two of them looked really similar until he figured out that they were actually twins when they came to the arts and crafts table together two days later.

Much to Grantaire’s surprise the kids actually seemed to like him. Or at least they liked him enough to drag him over to one of their tables to have dinner with them on the first evening.

“Look at you,” Bahorel said afterwards and ruffled Grantaire’s hair, “you’re the new favorite.”

“Yeah right,” Grantaire muttered, shaking his head at Bahorel, who went on to try to convince Jehan to give him a piggyback ride over to the fire pit where they’d have the first big bonfire with the kids. Jehan didn’t seem to be too intrigued by the idea and chased him down to the fire pit instead of carrying him.

“He’s right, though,” Enjolras said as he stepped up to Grantaire, “they do like you.”

Well, maybe they did. Grantaire hadn’t really been expecting it, but maybe he should just roll with it. “Believe me,” Grantaire said, “I’m just as surprised as you are.”

Enjolras frowned. “What makes you think I’m surprised?” he asked, but Grantaire didn’t get the chance to reply – honestly, he wasn’t even sure what he would have answered – because Feuilly called Enjolras’ name, so he had to rush off.

Only a couple of days ago Grantaire would have been glad if he didn’t have to spend much time with Enjolras, because of _the incident_ , but Enjolras hadn’t even mentioned it so far. So the more time he spent watching Enjolras from afar, leading the kids from activity to activity, only coming by the arts and crafts table every once in a while to see if everything was going fine, the more Grantaire wanted to talk to him and spend time with him. And he was probably being way too obvious about it.

Courfeyrac certainly noticed. Which was why one morning Grantaire was woken up by a shove long before Enjolras came to knock on their door to make sure they’d all crawl out of bed on time. “Grantaire,” Courfeyrac whispered, then the bed bounced, “I love you, which is why I’m telling you to look out the window right now.”

“Fuck off,” Grantaire muttered and tried to turn over so he could go back to sleep, but Courfeyrac booped his nose.

“I’m serious, you’re going to love this.”

Grantaire groaned, quietly, because there were other people in the cabin with them and they, much like Grantaire, wanted to sleep as long as possible. He followed Courfeyrac over to the window by his bed and looked outside. And, okay, he was glad that he’d got up for this.

Outside, between their cabins, was Enjolras and he was, well, Grantaire wasn’t quite sure what he was doing. Stretching? Maybe it was yoga? Whatever it was, though, it was quite the sight to see.

“What the hell,” Grantaire whispered.

“What are you guys doing?” Jehan asked and almost noiselessly stepped onto Courfeyrac’s bed to peer over Grantaire’s shoulder. “Oh my god.”

“Shut up,” Bahorel said gruffly and pulled his blanket over his head.

Jehan laughed quietly. “Sorry.”

Bahorel cracked an eye open. “What the hell are you doing?”

“We’re trying to figure out what the hell Enjolras is doing,” Courfeyrac said, not even trying to keep his voice down anymore.

Soon enough Bahorel joined them by the window and eventually Feuilly, his blanket still wrapped around his shoulders, did too. “Is Enjolras doing yoga really that exciting?” Feuilly asked lowly.

“So it _is_ yoga,” Courfeyrac said. “Amazing.”

“He started going to yoga classes about two months ago,” Feuilly mumbled. “Can we stop staring at him now?”

Before they could move though, Jehan leaned against Grantaire a bit too heavily, pushing him against the window with a low thunk. For a second it seemed like Enjolras hadn’t heard, but then he turned around, slowly, rolling his eyes at them when he spotted them.

Bahorel snorted and quickly ducked out of the way, pulling Feuilly down onto the mattress with him. Courfeyrac joined them with a squeal while Grantaire helped Jehan get off the bed without any major injuries. 

“Should we–” Jehan started, but he didn’t get very far.

The door opened and Enjolras peered inside. “I suppose I don’t have to wake you up this morning,” he said, narrowing his eyes at them. He didn’t actually look as pissed off as Grantaire had suspected he would be.

“Nope, we’re all awake,” Courfeyrac said cheerfully. “How are you on this fine morning?”

Enjolras only sighed, mumbled something about taking a shower and vanished.

“I bet he’s glad that we didn’t steal all his underwear this year,” Courfeyrac said and leaned back against the wall.

Grantaire snorted. “You stole his underwear?”

“Yeah, I mean, we get to have a little fun, too,” Courfeyrac said with a shrug. He smirked. “Maybe we should steal Combeferre’s shirts this year.”

Honestly, this whole thing didn’t seem much like a job to Grantaire anymore. Because they were having fun, he drew pictures with the kids, while Feuilly made pasta necklaces with them and then on Thursday they first got out the finger-paints. And it turned out to be a huge mess.

It wasn’t like Feuilly hadn’t warned him in the morning.

At the end of the day when they’d sent off the kids to have dinner and they started packing everything up, both of them were covered in paint from head to toe. They’d tried their best to remind the kids not to get any paint on their clothes but the two of them hadn’t actually paid that much attention to their own clothes. Grantaire now had several colorful handprints on his shirt and he was pretty sure that there was also paint in his hair.

“You two look so beautiful,” Bahorel shouted as he pushed the cart with the basketballs and volleyballs and ping pong paddles past them.

Feuilly grinned at him and then turned to Grantaire. “You have no idea how much I want to flip him off right now.”

Grantaire laughed and closed the last box with the finger-paints. “Let’s put these back quickly, I’m starving and I’m really scared that there won’t be any desserts left for us if we don’t hurry up.”

At least they weren’t the only ones affected by the finger-paint disaster. Marius had come by their table with a group of kids earlier and even though he’d obviously tried to wash it off, there were still traces of paint on his chin and all over his hands. Combeferre, on the other hand, hadn’t even tried to wipe off the flower that someone had painted on his cheek.

And for some reason even Enjolras, who’d been nowhere near the arts and crafts table all day had a purple streak on his shirt. He smiled at Grantaire when he sat down at the counselor’s table, which seemed to be the only table with empty seats.

“They got you too, huh?” Grantaire asked, nodding at Enjolras’ shirt.

“Yes, they were worried that I was missing out on the fun,” Enjolras said. “Finger-painting seems to be really popular.”

“Yeah, with the kids,” Feuilly said as he sank into the chair next to Grantaire.

Enjolras grinned. “It’s not that bad, is it?”

“Well, you’re not the one who ends up looking like a walking Jackson Pollock painting.”

“Aw, don’t be like that,” Courfeyrac said with a wink, “you’re both masterpieces.”

* * *

“Did you see...”

Grantaire had a vague idea what this was about, but he wasn’t going to do Courfeyrac that favor. “What?”

Courfeyrac sat down at the end of Grantaire’s bed, waiting patiently until Grantaire had put down his book. It was just the two of them in the cabin right now. Feuilly and Bahorel were still sitting on the steps out front, Jehan was still in their little library with Combeferre to pick scary stories for their next camp fire.  

“Did you see,” Courfeyrac looked around and leaned a little closer, “ _Combeferre_.”

“I saw him multiple times today, yes.”

Courfeyrac groaned and very dramatically threw himself across Grantaire’s bed, his arm draped over his face. “He went on the slide with the kids,” Courfeyrac whispered. “And then he was running around in his trunks, I hate my life.”

“I thought you were used to seeing him shirtless by now.”

Courfeyrac sighed and rolled onto his stomach. “I’ll never be used to that,” Courfeyrac mumbled into Grantaire’s bedsheets. “Why am I doing this to myself.”

Grantaire only snorted and patted Courfeyrac’s head.

“This is terrible, how do I stop liking him? I seriously wish I’d never noticed.”

“That he looks great with his shirt off? I’m pretty sure that there’s no way of _not_ noticing that. I mean, I noticed the day I met him and he was wearing clothes then.”

“Well, he also looks great with his clothes on. He looks great when he’s only slept for three hours or when he falls asleep on the couch and starts drooling. It’s not really what I meant though.” Courfeyrac finally turned his head – to be honest, Grantaire had been a little worried that Courfeyrac might not be able to breathe with his face smushed into a blanket.

“So, what did you mean?”

“I’m glad you asked,” Courfeyrac said and propped himself up on his elbows. “See, the thing is, I’ve known Combeferre for a really, really, _really_ long time. And I guess I’ve always low-key fancied him since, like, eighth or ninth grade, I guess? But in a _I’d be down if you were down, but if not, well then, never mind_ sort of way. Things were good, he was just one of my many hot friends, who was just around, being hot. And then I moved in with Enjolras and then Combeferre joined us and that’s basically when everything went to shit.” He groaned. “And don’t tell me that I’m being overdramatic, because I already know.”

Grantaire winked at him. “Maybe you should just get really drunk and tell him,” he suggested.

“Yeah, and then he’ll think that I’m just being friendly,” Courfeyrac said and stuck out his tongue at him. “I tell all my friends that I love them all the time. It’s a real problem, you know? Because we also cuddle a lot, really, Combeferre is very cuddly. He’s like a big teddy bear with amazing abs.”

“Christ,” Grantaire muttered. Well, he might have said equally embarrassing things about Enjolras at some point. He could only hope that Joly and Bossuet would never ever tell anyone about any of it.

“He’s just so nice,” Courfeyrac whined, “and I care about him so much. But I also want to make sweet love to him. No, actually I want him to make sweet love to me. And now let’s forget that I said anything.” He sighed and poked at Grantaire’s knee. “What about you? You seem to be getting along with Enjolras a lot better than you used to.”

“That’s just because we barely talk to each other,” Grantaire said with a shrug.

“Aw,” Courfeyrac said, batting his eyelashes at him, “do you miss talking to him. Do you miss the arguing about completely ridiculous shit because you can’t have a normal conversation and the glaring whenever you’re not paying attention?”

Grantaire rolled his eyes. “No, I don’t. It’s nice... you know, that he’s actually nice to me. Although it’s kinda weird. Do you think he’s just pretending because he does know that I... well, you know... and he just wants to save me the embarrassment?”

“Wow,” Courfeyrac said, shaking his head, “you’re fucking ridiculous.”

“Thanks a lot,” Grantaire grumbled and shoved Courfeyrac off his bed. Well, at first it was only his feet, but the rest of Courfeyrac quickly followed, fingers still clinging to Grantaire’s blanket.

“You suck,” Courfeyrac said cheerfully as the blanket eventually slid off the bed as well and Courfeyrac landed on the floor with a squeak that quickly turned into laughter.

Courfeyrac was still on the floor laughing when the door opened and Jehan came in, Combeferre following at his heels, both of them stopping dead right in front of Courfeyrac.

“Why are you on the floor?” Combeferre asked, his amusement quite clear in his voice.

Courfeyrac made a choking sound and quickly sat up, tugging his fingers through his hair. “Because Grantaire is a poop.”

“Well, that explains it,” Jehan said and flopped down on Grantaire’s bed.

Combeferre joined them, still smiling down at Courfeyrac, who seemed to be unsure whether or not he wanted to stay on the floor or sit down next to Combeferre.

“Are you going to stay down there?” Combeferre eventually asked and scooted over to make space for Courfeyrac.

Grantaire sort of wanted to remind them that there were four other beds in this cabin and that not all of them needed to sit on the same twin-sized bed, but he knew that Courfeyrac absolutely wouldn’t mind sitting right next to Combeferre, so he kept his mouth shut and turned to braiding Jehan’s hair while he told them about the scary short stories he and Combeferre had found.

* * *

That night, after Combeferre had gone back to his own cabin and Grantaire had paid Joly and Bossuet a visit in cabin 3, Grantaire finally learned why the beds next to the door were so unpopular.

It wasn’t too long after they’d all gone to bed – Grantaire actually wasn’t sure if he’d already been asleep or just on the way there – when the steps outside their cabin creaked, followed by a tentative knock on the door.

Someone outside cleared their throat. “Cosette?”

“Grantaire, get up, you’re next to the door,” Bahorel grumbled.

Grantaire sighed and, instead of reminding Bahorel that he was also sleeping in a bed next to the door, slipped out of bed and opened the door to see what was going on. Outside the door were two girls, looking up at him with wide eyes.

“What’s up?” Grantaire asked and quickly stepped outside, so they wouldn’t end up waking up everyone in the cabin. “Is everything okay?”

The girls looked at each other and then one of them, Grantaire was pretty sure that her name was Camille, shook her head. “We heard noises and Cosette said if... she said to come get her.”

“Sure, yeah,” Grantaire said. “Well, Cosette is sleeping in that cabin over there,” he pointed at the cabin all the counselors were sleeping in, “but maybe I can help you? What’s that noise you’ve been hearing?”

The other girl nodded, took him by the hand and he was dragged back to their cabin, where six other girls were anxiously waiting in the door.

Emma, one of the girls who’d come to the arts and crafts table every single day so far, smiled at him. “’Aire,” she said, waving at him.

Grantaire waved back at her. “So, what about that noise?” he whispered. “Can you hear it right now?”

They all fell silent for a moment, all of them listening for noises. Grantaire couldn’t hear anything that sounded strange for a long moment, then he heard the plastic covers that were tied over the boats flutter in the wind.

“That was it,” Camille said excitedly, “did you hear it?”

Grantaire nodded. “Yeah, I heard that. And I know exactly what that is.”

“You do?”

“I do,” Grantaire said and ushered them all back into their cabin . “I’m pretty sure you guys can figure it out if I give you a hint. You know what Joly and Bossuet do so no water gets into the boats?”

“Oh, I know,” Emma said, bouncing up and down on her bed, “they put the blue plastic on them.”

“The plastic is making the noises?”

“Exactly,” Grantaire said, “it’s because it’s a little windy tonight. Okay, so how about you guys go back to bed and I’ll take a look at those canvases to make sure they don’t fly away.”

He made sure that they’d all gone back to bed, told them to come get someone if anything else came up and then switched the lights off and wished that a good night. Grantaire had barely even closed the door when he nearly jumped out of skin. There was someone walking towards him on the gravelly part. The little lamps that were stuck in the ground alongside the path weren’t that bright, but it still took Grantaire only a second to realize that it was Enjolras.

“What’s wrong?” Enjolras asked lowly. His hair was falling loosely down his shoulders and he was wearing flip flops and an extremely oversized camp hoodie. It should have looked ridiculous, but Grantaire was pretty sure that he’d never thought Enjolras was this adorable before.

“The kids heard a noise,” Grantaire said with a shrug. “I’m pretty sure it’s the boat covers. I was gonna check if they’re all fixed properly, but the wind is not that bad anyway, so I guess it should be fine.”

“Right,” Enjolras said, nodding, “I’ll come with you.”

“You really don’t need to.”

“What if you fall into the lake?” Enjolras asked and started walking down the path to the boats.

“Then I guess I’d just get out again and put on dry clothes,” Grantaire mumbled, but followed him.

It didn’t take long to check the covers. Enjolras had even brought a small flashlight that he’d pulled out of the pocket of his hoodie. Grantaire was starting to wonder what else he had in there.  

To be honest, Grantaire was eager to get back to bed, so they walked briskly on their way back to their cabins. Well, until Enjolras let out a yelp and stopped walking.

Grantaire turned around. “You okay?”

“I lost my flip flop,” Enjolras muttered. He quickly slipped it back on and caught up with Grantaire again. “Thanks for your help, by the way.”

“Well, they came to our cabin, what was I supposed to do? Tell them to fuck off?”

Enjolras let out a huff. “Language,” he whispered.

“Oh, come on, everyone’s asleep,” Grantaire said and gave him a gentle shove.

Enjolras laughed quietly and then fell silent, stopping in front of Grantaire’s cabin before he went back to his own. He looked at Grantaire for a long moment – and Grantaire was pretty sure that he’d never stop being anxious about Enjolras brining up _the thing_ – but in the end Enjolras only smiled and said, “Sleep well, Grantaire.”

“Yeah, um, goodnight,” Grantaire said and slipped back into his cabin as quietly as he could.


	4. Chapter 4

“I don’t know why,” Courfeyrac said as they were on their way to breakfast, “but somehow the kids always come to _our_ cabin when they have a problem in the middle of the night.”

“Probably because the counselor’s cabin is hidden behind ours,” Feuilly mused. He patted Grantaire on the back. “It’s not that often that they need something, though.”

“Yeah, I mean, Enjolras noticed that something was wrong, too. Honestly, does he ever sleep?”

“I’m pretty sure that he has some sixth sense for when the kids aren’t in their beds.”

“Yeah, he’s–” Courfeyrac stopped dead and looked up at the grey and overcast sky. “Uh-oh, pretty sure that that was a raindrop.”

“Don’t worry, Enjolras said it was just going to be light rain this morning, so it’s hopefully going to stop soon.”

It had started to rain sometime early in the morning and Enjolras had come to wake them up so they could set up a couple of tents, one for the arts and crafts table, one for Jehan’s writing workshop, so the main building wouldn’t get too crowded. Other than that they’d just have to hope that the weather forecast had been right and that the rain wasn’t going to last for that long.

They’d also been planning on having their first movie night today. Bahorel had asked Grantaire to help him set up the screen later on – apparently they usually tied it to two trees next to the field, but they could hardly sit in the field if everything was wet.

“Let’s wait a couple of hours,” Enjolras said when Bahorel voiced that exact concern during breakfast. “We might have to postpone it, though.”

Courfeyrac hummed, staring down at his phone. “Yeah, it doesn’t look too good for today.”

Enjolras sighed. “Alright, then,” he said and turned to Jehan. “If the rain gets too heavy you can take the writing workshop into the library, it’s not ideal since there are mostly couches and hardly any tables in there, but Grantaire and Feuilly also have to take the arts and crafts table inside and we still need enough empty tables for dinner.”

Grantaire had suggested that they could just set up the screen inside, but was then shushed by several people around him because, “Grantaire, the whole point of movie night at camp is that it’s _not inside_.”

“Well, just tell us when to evacuate, then,” Grantaire said with a wink.

“Not funny,” Enjolras grumbled.

“One time, I think two years ago, the rain got so bad that half the camp was flooded,” Combeferre explained. He gave Enjolras a nudge. “But it doesn’t look like it’s going to be that bad this year, so take a deep breath.”

Enjolras did, but then pursed his lips. “I just think we should be prepared.”

“We are,” Combeferre said. “Not for everything, but definitely for heavy rain. So don’t...” He trailed off when two of the kids showed up at their table. “What’s up, guys?”

“Can we go into the lake today? Because David said that it’s icky and that we weren’t allowed,” one of them said. Grantaire was pretty sure that he’d never seem him before. There weren’t even that many kids at camp and Grantaire had been convinced that he knew all of them by now. Apparently he’d been mistaken.

“Well,” Combeferre says, “sometimes, when it rains, the lake gets a bit icky, David is right about that. Has anyone been down to the lake to take a look?”

“Not yet,” Joly piped up, “but we’ll take a look right after breakfast. It’s probably going to be a lot colder than yesterday, so maybe you’ll want to do something else instead.”

Bossuet nodded. “Musichetta told me that she’s going to bake cupcakes this afternoon and she’s going to need help with that.”

That seemed to be good enough for them because they nodded and trailed back over to their friends, soon involved in a lively discussion, probably about whether or not they should go for making cupcakes.

“Right,” Enjolras said, “if we have to postpone movie night, we can just have it sometime next week. We have a night hike planned for Monday, but only if the ground isn’t too muddy. I need all counselors to ask everyone in their groups whether or not they want to join Bahorel for the night hike.”

Grantaire looked at Bahorel, who wiggled his eyebrows. “You’re not going hiking?” Grantaire asked Enjolras.

“Well, someone has to stay here with the kids who don’t want to go hiking,” Enjolras said with a shrug. “Obviously we don’t force them to go if they don’t want to.”

Combeferre snorted and Courfeyrac gave Enjolras a pat on the back. “You know, if you want to go hiking this year, it’s okay, I can stay here with the kids.” He smiled broadly. “Enjolras, really, you should have just said something.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes. “No, it’s okay, don’t worry.”

“Yeah, it’s because you hate hiking, just admit it, we all know,” Courfeyrac said and elbowed Enjolras in the ribs.

“If you all know, then I don’t actually have to admit it, do I?”

Courfeyrac snorted and picked up Enjolras’ toast. “Here, eat your breakfast.”

Enjolras took the toast from Courfeyrac, glaring at him for a moment before he turned to Cosette to discuss next week’s scavenger hunt with her.

Grantaire spent most of the morning helping kids draw faces on paper plates and tying rubber bands to them so they could use them as masks, while Feuilly was mainly just sharpening all their colored pencils.

The rain didn’t start again until lunch, so Courfeyrac did his usual dancing workshop out in the field and then it started to drizzle, but some of the kids were still running around in the field, playing catch with Marius, or bustling about the playground. In the afternoon, their tent was packed with kids to a point where they had to send some of them back inside because there wasn’t enough space for everyone.

Eventually, Enjolras slipped inside, waving Grantaire over. “We’re going to postpone movie night,” Enjolras said lowly. “It really makes no sense in this weather.” He looked down at his feet, where water was already pooling around his shoes.  Apparently some of it was getting in under the tent flaps, even though they’d tried their best to keep them closed. “Let’s send them all inside, shall we?”

Grantaire nodded. They’d all end up with wet feet if they stuck around for much longer. They’d given up on making masks a while ago anyway because the tent had been too full. Most of the kids were just drawing pictures now.

“Alright, guys,” Grantaire said, “we’re gonna have to go inside.”

The kids didn’t seem to be too happy about it, but most of them stopped grumbling when Enjolras told them that they could keep drawing inside.

“It’s a good thing we bought plastic boxes for all our stuff,” Enjolras mused as he helped Grantaire and Feuilly pack up the art supplies.

They sent the kids inside and then started carrying the boxes over to the main building. It wasn’t even far, but since they couldn’t actually walk that fast with the boxes, they ended up with soaked clothes anyway. Well, Grantaire and Feuilly did – Enjolras, always prepared, was wearing his big yellow rain coat.

The main building was packed like it usually only was during meal times. Grantaire peered into the small library on their way inside, where the kids were squeezed on couches, reading or writing. Jehan was sitting on the floor, smiling at something that one of the kids was showing him.

“Just put it right here,” Enjolras said, nodding at the stack of boxes that they’d already carried inside. “I’ll set up one of the cafeteria tables as the arts and crafts table. You two should probably get changed, I don’t want you to get sick.” He pulled a huge umbrella out of a bucket next to the door. “Take this and don’t forget to put on your raincoats.”

 “Thanks, mom,” Grantaire said, grinning at him. To be honest, he probably should have dug his raincoat out of his bag this morning, but he’d forgotten all about it.

The corner of Enjolras’ mouth twitched. “Try not to take too long, I’m not exactly an arts and crafts genius.”

Enjolras seemed to be doing pretty well when Grantaire and Feuilly returned to the cafeteria where Enjolras had set everything up. There wasn’t as much space as there was outside and Enjolras had only unpacked the colored pencils and the crayons.

Amidst the kids, Enjolras was also drawing something. Grantaire peered over his shoulder. “What are you drawing?”

Enjolras jumped. “It’s... well, it’s you and Feuilly as dragons.” He cleared his throat. “Marie suggested it and I thought it was a great idea.”

Marie, across the table, was beaming at Grantaire. “An excellent idea,” Grantaire agreed. “Maybe I should draw Enjolras as a dragon, what do you think?”

Grantaire was busy drawing a dragon version of Enjolras while Feuilly unpacked the coloring books and then joined them once Enjolras had left to see how everyone else was doing. He’d promised that he would come back to finish his drawing, but it seemed that he’d already been roped into joining a group of kids in playing Trivial Pursuit against some of the kids in Combeferre’s group and Combeferre himself. Even though they were apparently playing a kids’ version of the game, Grantaire was pretty sure that Enjolras had no chance of winning unless Combeferre toned it down _a lot_. Now that Grantaire thought about it, Combeferre probably would.

“Grantaire...” Lucas tapped on Grantaire’s shoulder. “Are we still making shirts tomorrow?”

“Well, that depends...” They’d wanted to tie-dye shirts tomorrow, and they also had fabric pens, but they’d definitely have to go outside for that. “If the weather is better tomorrow, we can definitely make shirts, but if it’s still raining we’ll have to do that some other time. But there’ll be shirts for everyone who wants one, I promise.”

“We’ll let you know tomorrow morning after breakfast,” Feuilly threw in. “If we can’t go outside, we’ll find something else to do. We were going to make pasta necklaces a few days from now, I’m sure we can also do that in here. Or maybe we’ll make flower crowns. Or whichever other crowns you want to make.”

Going by the reaction of the kids around them, the flower crowns seemed to be decidedly more popular. Grantaire was sure that Jehan would also be excited about the flower crowns – he’d already made Grantaire promise that he’d make one for Jehan if he didn’t have the time to make one himself.

Eventually they had to clear off the tables in the back of the cafeteria because everyone was gathering for dinner and they ended up needing all of the tables. Afterwards they all stayed in the cafeteria and pushed the tables aside so they could gather in a circle to play games and eat the cupcakes that Musichetta and the rest of the kitchen staff had made with the kids in the afternoon.

Before they were all sent off to bed, Jehan read them a story that he’d picked with some of the kids in the library earlier.

“Alright everyone,” Enjolras said after the end of the story, “time for you to get ready for bed. Don’t forget to put on your raincoats, guys!”

While Combeferre and Cosette ushered the kids outside and made sure they all got ready for bed, everyone else quickly put the tables back for breakfast, then Enjolras waved them all over.

“The rain should stop completely sometime around noon tomorrow. I think it might be better if you,” he nodded at Grantaire and Feuilly, then Jehan, “stay inside after breakfast. ‘Chetta, you’re still making cookies tomorrow?”

“That’s the plan, but I’d love an extra set of eyes to make sure that the kids don’t eat all of the raw cookie dough.”

“Maybe Joly and Bossuet can help you out? I’m sure no one will want to go into the lake tomorrow anyway. Everyone else is on board game duty until the rain stops, we’ll just take it from there.”

* * *

The next morning Grantaire luckily didn’t forget to put on his raincoat – mainly thanks to Jehan – even though it then turned out that he didn’t actually need it. It was just drizzling in the morning and after breakfast the rain finally stopped.

They decided to keep the tents outside, just in case, but they rolled up the flaps on all sides and then prepared the flowers and the wire for the flower crowns. He and Feuilly had both thought it safer to save the tie-dyed shirts for some other day when they didn’t have a chance of rain.

Making flower crowns was almost relaxing. To be honest, working at camp was exhausting, but for an entirely different reason than Grantaire had expected. He’d thought that being around kids all the time would end up being stressful, maybe even annoying, but most of them were actually nice and, okay, they were incredibly loud, but mostly it was because the kids were excited, not because they were fighting. What really was the most exhausting thing was that there were literally always people around and Grantaire was really starting to notice it by the end of the first week. But this was what he’d signed up for. And that was what Grantaire kept telling himself.

Still, when Enjolras asked whether or not anyone wanted to stay at camp instead of going on the night hike, which apparently was ridiculously popular with the kids and counselors alike, Grantaire was the first one to volunteer.

He could hear Courfeyrac snigger quietly, but this had really nothing to do with what he obviously thought this was about. Grantaire wasn’t sticking around because of Enjolras, he just had a feeling that staying at camp with the handful of kids who didn’t want to go hiking might actually be a nice change.

“Thank you,” Enjolras said, smiling at him. He was still wearing the flower crown that Grantaire had made for him with some of the kids in the afternoon.

They’d made several for all the counselors and activity leaders who didn’t have a chance to swing by the table, and also for the kitchen and maintenance staff. Grantaire was wearing one as well. He’d let several different kids pick the colors for his, which was probably why it had ended up being the biggest and most colorful one of them all. Some of the kids were also wearing crowns that they’d decorated with fake jewels, but his favorite really was Jehan, who’d stuck flowers into his braid in addition to his flower crown.

A lot of the kids seemed to like it too, which was why Jehan and Cosette later on asked Grantaire if they could have the leftover flowers to braid them into some kids’ hair the next day.

On Monday morning they were woken up by the early morning sun – or, well, Feuilly was and woke them all up in turn by grumbling that someone really needed to turn off the fucking sun.

The sun being out, though, was actually good news, because that meant that they hopefully didn’t have to postpone the night hike and that they’d be able to finally have their movie night tomorrow.

“Looks like we’re in for a couple of sunny days,” Enjolras said during breakfast, “please remind everyone in your groups to put on sunscreen and to stay hydrated. Bahorel, are you all set for the night hike?”

“Yep, all good. There’s only a couple of kids sticking around. Emily is staying because she can’t walk that far... I told her that we could pull her along with that little cart we have, but she said she’d rather stay. Emma and Amélie are sticking around, too, so are Paul and Tom.”

“Sarah is also staying,” Cosette said, “I just talked to her this morning. She stepped on a bee yesterday and the only shoes she can wear right now are flip flops. I think it’s not the best idea for her to go and she agrees.”

Enjolras nodded. “Let me know if anyone else decides that they don’t want to go. Joly, are you going?”

Joly, who’d been busy wiping Nutella off Bossuet’s face, only shrugged. “No worries, my leg is fine.”

“Okay, I suppose it should be alright if Grantaire and I are the only ones who stay here with the kids. We’re all going to meet outside at nine o’clock.”

“By the way,” Feuilly said, “we’re doing the tie-dye shirts today, can you guys make sure that not everyone’s coming by at the same time? Grantaire and I still have to set up, but you can send them over in a bit, preferably in small groups. They can come over to draw whenever they want, but we can only do so many shirts at the same time.”

“Sure, we’ll send them over in groups.”

Grantaire spent all morning and the better part of the afternoon dipping shirts into dye while Feuilly tied rubber bands around them. They ended up making some for all the volunteers as well. Feuilly said they did every year and Grantaire could imagine the stacks of horrific tie-dyed shirts in all of his friends’ closets.

Even though the kids were really excited about their shirts, Grantaire found the constant dipping shirts into dye a little monotonous after a while and in the end he was actually almost excited when he got to go back to drawing pictures with the kids.

“Good day?” Enjolras asked as they watched the kids gather in the field before the night hike. “I was going to come by, but I was involved in a very intense game of hide and seek.”

Grantaire snorted. “Very intense, huh?”

“Two of the kids hid in a boat and it took us ages to find them.”

Going by Enjolras’ face, it hadn’t been the most pleasant experience. “You were scared shitless, weren’t you?”

“Well, for a second I was actually scared that we wouldn’t find them. We just declared them the winners, so they came out again, but I was honestly starting to think that they might have got lost in the woods. Eaten by a bear or...”

“Or kidnapped by woodland fairies.”

Enjolras smiled. “Exactly. I’m never playing hide and seek again.”

Once again, Grantaire had a feeling that Enjolras was somehow trying extra hard to be nice to him for some reason. Really, it was starting to get to a point where Grantaire wanted to ask him what was going on. If it had anything to do with _the thing_.

Instead, he just cleared his throat. “So,” he said, “what are we going to do tonight?”

“Well, we just have a handful of kids staying here, let’s see what they want to do.”

As it turned out, some of the kids decided to hang out in their cabins, two of them holed up in the blanket fort that Jehan had set up in the library, and in the end Grantaire was left sitting in the cafeteria with Enjolras and a plate of cookies that Musichetta had saved for them.

Grantaire took the time to check his emails – nothing significant – and some texts that he’d decided weren’t that important during the last couple of days. Most of them were invitations to parties, people asking him if he wanted to join them at the Musain, or at the Corinthe. Grantaire told them all that he was out of town and would be for another three weeks.

“I’m getting a cup of coffee, do you want anything?”

“You’re drinking coffee?” Grantaire asked. “Do you want to not sleep tonight?”

“Well, I’m going to be up for a few more hours,” Enjolras said with a shrug.

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “Seriously, do you ever sleep?”

“I usually just stay up a little longer than everyone else and make sure everything’s quiet and the lights stay out after midnight.”

“And then you get up at five to do yoga?”

“Not every day.” Enjolras shrugged. “It’s nice by the lake when the sun is starting to come up, you know?”

“Maybe I’ll check it out sometime,” Grantaire said. Quite frankly, he was sleeping remarkably well on his tiny bed, much better than back at his apartment, and he was certainly going to enjoy it while it lasted.

Enjolras pulled a face. “Sure you will,” he said. “So, no coffee?”

“Nah, I’m good.”

Enjolras soon returned to him with a massive mug. They discussed the movie night for a bit, the shirt that Feuilly had set aside for Enjolras this afternoon – “We made an extra colorful one for you,” Grantaire told him – and he was pretty sure that it was the most civil and most pleasant conversation they’d ever had.

It was hardly surprising that Enjolras talked nearly as passionately about caramel popcorn as he did about the issues they dealt with at their student group meetings. Except that they didn’t start fighting when Grantaire said that he wasn’t too fond of caramel popcorn. Had it been any other topic their conversation would have probably ended with an argument.

They were still deep into a conversation about caramel – Grantaire was really fond of it as long as it wasn’t anywhere near popcorn – when two of the kids asked if they would play board games with them.

* * *

“You’re still alive. You and Enjolras. Both of you,” Courfeyrac said and ruffled Grantaire’s hair. “Well done.”

“You weren’t actually worried, were you?”

Courfeyrac tucked his feet under Grantaire’s blanket. “Nah, we were just wondering if it was safe to leave you two alone together.”

“Don’t listen to him,” Jehan said, “Courfeyrac wasn’t thinking about anything other than Combeferre’s ass.”

“The door is open,” Courfeyrac whined and pulled Grantaire’s blanket over his head.

“Sorry,” Jehan whispered. He patted Courfeyrac’s blanket-covered head. “You know, maybe you should just ask him out. But mention that it’s a date. Because I have a feeling that he might not get it otherwise.”

Courfeyrac only let out a vague grunt from under the blanket.

“What is Courfeyrac doing?” Bahorel asked when he came walking into the cabin.

“Pretty sure that he’s regretting all his life choices,” Grantaire said.


	5. Chapter 5

“’Aire, look,” Emma shouted, beaming at him as she pointed at the two bright green handprints on her cheeks. “I painted myself.”

“It’s a very nice color,” Grantaire said, “but remember what Feuilly said earlier? The paint is supposed to go on the paper.” At least she’d just painted her face and hadn’t tried to eat it. Someone had said something about the red paint looking a lot like ketchup and Grantaire had been a little antsy ever since.

Emma only grinned and thankfully proceeded to draw on her paper and not on herself or any of the kids around her.

“Hey, Grantaire.” Bahorel had come over to their table, smirking at the orange dot on the tip of Feuilly’s nose. “Finger-paints are great.” He patted Grantaire on the back. “I’m gonna start setting up for movie night before it gets ridiculously hot, are you coming?”

“Sure, yeah,” Grantaire said and quickly wiped his hands on his shirt.

“Grantaire,” Feuilly said, shaking his head, “the paint is supposed to go on the paper.”

The kids around them were still giggling when Grantaire walked off with Bahorel. It took them a while to set up the screen – well, the screen was just a big white piece of cloth that was tied to a long wooden rod so there wouldn’t be any crinkles in the fabric, but it still ended up being a piece of work. Afterwards they took care of the loudspeakers and the stand for the projector, which thankfully didn’t take as long.

“Let’s just assume that it’s working,” Bahorel said, nodding at the projector that was still standing under the roof of the main building. “It’s too bright to see if it works right now anyway.”

“So, what if it doesn’t work?”

“Twenty bucks says Enjolras has a crying fit,” Bahorel said. “Nah, it’s fine. Valjean brought it over the other day and he said that they tried it out at the office and that it works just fine.”

Grantaire frowned. He hadn’t seen Valjean around. “Valjean was here?”

“Yeah, the day before we’d originally planned to have the movie night. He didn’t have much time, apparently. But he’ll probably be back sometime this week to see how everything’s going. He usually takes a look around and talks to all the volunteers, but I guess he didn’t have time for that last week.”

Grantaire only hummed about that. He probably had nothing to worry about. There wasn’t too much he could screw up at the arts and crafts table – unless he let one of the kids eat an entire tube of paint right in front of his eyes. “So,” Grantaire said, “what are we even watching?”

“No idea,” Bahorel said with a shrug. “The kids are allowed to vote after dinner. Enjolras has, like, five movies on a list and the kids get to pick one.”

“Of course he lets them vote.” Grantaire laughed. “Well, I’m just hoping that I don’t have to watch _Sleeping Beauty_ or something like that.”

“Aw, come on,” Bahorel said and threw a spare piece of string at him, “you fucking love _Sleeping Beauty_.”

“Language,” Grantaire said dryly and threw the piece of string back. “Let me know if you need help with anything else, I’m going back to the finger-paints.”

Back at the arts and crafts table, Enjolras was sitting amidst a group of kids, finger-painting what vaguely looked like a simplified version of camp. Grantaire joined them and filled up paints and handed out more paper and accepted gifts from kids. He had plenty of those already and he wasn’t quite sure how on earth was supposed to take all of them home, especially since he’d probably get a lot more during the next two and a half weeks. He’d have to ask Feuilly about that. Although Feuilly would probably just tell him that he had a massive box full of gifts from children somewhere at home.

Half an hour later, Enjolras was covered in paint – there were streaks on his face and in his hair from where he’d brushed away flyaway strands, on his shirt from where kids had tried to get his attention to show him their pictures, and all over his hands from the actual painting.

“Wow, looks like someone really needs to wash their hands,” Feuilly said and gave Enjolras a pat on the back.

“You should probably jump straight into the lake,” Grantaire said. It had been a joke, but the kids seemed to love the idea and started cheering Enjolras on.

Feuilly laughed. “Oh, Enjolras, you better run.”

Enjolras didn’t look too happy for a moment but eventually stood up and pulled his phone out of his pocket. He handed it to Grantaire. “Hold on to this for me.”

Grantaire nodded and watched with great amusement as Enjolras darted off, about a dozen kids in his wake, chasing him across the field, over to the volleyball field where Bahorel cheered them on, then back past the arts and crafts table. Grantaire had only recently learned that Enjolras could run this fast when he’d finally gone to one of their group’s protests. But he also knew that Enjolras could only keep that up for so long, which was probably why he was now finally running towards the lake.

“Is he seriously jumping in?” Grantaire said, more to himself than to anyone else.

Feuilly nodded, grinning broadly. “Yep.”

“So dedicated,” Grantaire said. But, to be honest, he’d never actually expected otherwise. Enjolras was dedicated to his causes. Always. And now his cause was those kids and this camp and if Enjolras needed to jump into a lake fully clothed for those kids to have a good time, then he’d obviously do just that.

Enjolras jumped in without hesitation, the kids bouncing up and down at the shore of the lake, all of them laughing when Joly made a show of trying to fish Enjolras out of the water.

The lake was pretty popular that day in general, since it was so hot. It really was the perfect day for movie night, because it’d definitely still be warm later on when the sun had gone down.

Grantaire let himself be talked into joining Feuilly and the two girls who hadn’t raced off to chase Enjolras into the lake in finger-painting another picture, although he did cast a glance over at the lake every now and again. He watched as Enjolras emerged from the lake, his white shirt with the camp logo on it now completely see-through and clinging to his chest.

Feuilly snorted when he saw that he was staring and Grantaire quickly turned back to his painting, which he eventually gave to one of the kids. Soon enough their table was completely empty, and Jehan’s seemed to be as well. He came wandering over to them and let Grantaire paint two flowers on his cheeks.

“Do you have any idea what I’d give to be in that lake right now,” Feuilly said lowly.

Grantaire gave him a nudge. “There’s no one here, just go.”

Jehan loudly cleared his throat.

“Except for Jehan,” Grantaire added, “and I can totally handle Jehan.”

“Please, Jehan is worse than all of those kids combined.”

Jehan beamed at him and got himself a sheet of paper. “I’ll be good,” he said and shooed Feuilly away. “Still having fun?” Jehan asked Grantaire.

“I’m not gonna lie, this isn’t the easiest job I’ve ever had,” Grantaire muttered.

Jehan nodded knowingly. “The kids can be difficult at times.” He dipped a finger into the black paint. “You know, if you ever need a break or anything, just tell Enjolras, someone else can help Feuilly with the arts and crafts stuff for a bit.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” Grantaire said with a shrug. “I’m taking a break right now.”

“Enjolras won’t think that you’re... I don’t know, that you can’t handle this or anything. Most of the new volunteers look a little dead behind the eyes if you ask me.”

“Yeah, but they’re counselors.”

“Dude, even Louison looks super tired after a long day of cooking with the kids,” Jehan said. “It’s cool. When this is over I’m gonna go home and sleep for a week.”

Grantaire sighed. “I’m gonna go to the Corinthe. And then I’m gonna sleep, too. I’ll be fine until then, though.”

Jehan eyed him for a moment, but apparently decided that Grantaire wasn’t lying and went back to painting his picture. To be honest, Grantaire really enjoyed the sound of the distant laughter, the delighted screams over by the lake as Enjolras chased the kids around with a massive water gun. It was mainly because they were far away and Grantaire could sit at the arts and crafts table, doodling idly until it was time to pack up all the supplies. Feuilly, still dripping, came back to help him, before Grantaire sent him off to get changed before dinner just like the kids.

* * *

Once the sun had started to go down, Grantaire helped Bahorel set up the projector, Enjolras standing next to them, watching them with raised eyebrows. “Do you need help?”

“No, we got this,” Bahorel said and took the massive extension cord from Grantaire. “Wait, here, you can plug this in. And bring the movie.”

Enjolras returned to them quickly and Bahorel turned on the projector and put the DVD that Enjolras handed to him into the DVD player.

“What are we watching?” Grantaire asked as he waited for _something_ to appear on their makeshift screen. “Please tell me it’s something cool.”

“Please tell me it’s something that won’t make me cry,” Bahorel said lowly.

Enjolras smirked. “Don’t worry, it’s _Finding Nemo_.” He nodded at the screen. “Are you guys good here? I have to go get the kids. And can one of you two ask Musichetta to get the snacks ready?”

“There are snacks?”

“Popcorn, chips and ice cream,” Enjolras said, already starting to walk away.

“Nice,” Grantaire said and elbowed Bahorel in the ribs. “I’m gonna go tell ‘Chetta, you can take care of Nemo.”

Half an hour later, Musichetta was still handing out snacks while the kids were gathering in the field, sitting down on blankets in front of the screen. Grantaire got himself a bag of chips and joined Bahorel in the back by the projector. They were still waiting for Enjolras to come back to them, because as long as he wasn’t here, it was safe to assume that neither were all of the kids.

Combeferre was already sitting near the front, Feuilly and Jehan right behind him. Joly and Bossuet seemed to be saving Musichetta a seat. One by one all the counselors and the rest of the stuff found themselves a place to sit, and eventually Enjolras flopped down on the blanket next to Grantaire with a bunch of pillows and bag full of snacks.

“These were left over,” Enjolras said when Grantaire raised his eyebrows at the bag. “We can start the movie, everyone’s here.”

“Not everyone,” Courfeyrac said and also squeezed himself onto their blanket.

“Who’s missing?”

“I wasn’t here,” Courfeyrac whispered. “You would have totally started without me.”

“Why are you sitting on my blanket?” Bahorel said flatly.

“Grantaire and Enjolras are sitting on your blanket, too,” Courfeyrac said and peered into Enjolras’ bag. “Ohh, is that popcorn?”

Bahorel started the movie and gently shoved Courfeyrac off the blanket. “Take some and then go sit with Combeferre.”

Courfeyrac stuck out his tongue at Bahorel, but did take some popcorn and quickly walked over to Combeferre, who smiled brightly when Courfeyrac sat down next to him.

Grantaire did his best to pay attention to _Finding Nemo_ , even though he’d already seen it about half a dozen times, but Enjolras kept offering him some of his caramel popcorn and eventually Grantaire decided to try some to humor him.

Not too long after the movie had started, Enjolras yawned loudly. “I’m so glad that the kids get to sleep in tomorrow.”

“I meant to ask you,” Grantaire whispered, “does that mean that we get to sleep in as well?” Not that the kids usually got up _that_ early, but Grantaire was really hoping that he wouldn’t have to get up at seven just this one time. He missed sleeping in.

“I’ll have to get up early, just so someone is awake, but I suppose I could wake you all up a little later than usual.”

“Why don’t you let someone else get up early?” Grantaire mumbled. “You look like you could use some sleep.”

“I’m head counselor,” Enjolras said matter-of-factly. “But if you’d like to volunteer...”

Grantaire huffed out a laugh. “Nah, I’d rather not.”

“Thought so,” Enjolras said and shoved a handful of caramel popcorn into his mouth. A few minutes later Enjolras yawned again, his eyelids fluttering dangerously.

“Why don’t you just take a nap?” Bahorel suggested.

Enjolras frowned. “What, now?”

“It’s not like anyone would notice,” Grantaire said with a shrug. The three of them were sitting pretty far away from everyone else and the kids weren’t paying attention to anything but the movie anyway.

“I’m fine,” Enjolras said and opened a bag of chips. “Seriously, I’m used to being sleep deprived.”

Enjolras was fast asleep fifteen minutes later with his head pillowed on Grantaire’s shoulder. Grantaire still wasn’t quite sure how that had happened and he also wasn’t too happy with Bahorel, who was giggling quietly next to him, but Grantaire knew that Enjolras really needed some sleep, so he didn’t even try to move him and just accepted his cruel fate.

Even though Enjolras seemed to have been terribly embarrassed about falling asleep on Grantaire afterwards, he still continued to be scarily nice to Grantaire. There were smiles and small-talk and not even a hint of a disagreement. Grantaire was too perplexed to even think about trying to pick a fight just to see how Enjolras would react.

“It’s unsettling,” Grantaire mumbled. Enjolras had just handed him a leftover ice cream cone in passing.

Courfeyrac was eyeing the ice cream in envy. “That he just gave you the ice cream instead of me, his best friend?”

“He’s being nice,” Grantaire said. “He’s being nice _to me_.”

“If you don’t want the ice cream...” Courfeyrac trailed off when Combeferre came walking towards them.

Combeferre smiled at them. “I know the two of you are technically off duty, but some of the kids want to take the boats out on the lake for a bit, do you want to come?”

“I’m busy,” Grantaire said and held up his ice cream.

Courfeyrac scrambled to his feet. “I’m not.”

Grantaire snorted, which earned him a glare from Courfeyrac. When the two of them walked away, though, Courfeyrac quickly turned around to wink at Grantaire.

Combeferre and Courfeyrac seemed to spend every free minute together since the movie night. Sometimes Combeferre came by to hang out in their cabin, sometimes he and Courfeyrac sat in front of the main building after dinner. Grantaire had also noticed that Combeferre joined the kids in his group in a lot more dancing workshops than he had during the first week of camp.

Grantaire somehow made it through an incredibly hot week, didn’t embarrass himself when Valjean visited them, they managed not to lose any kids during the scavenger hunt, which Enjolras certainly seemed to count as an accomplishment, especially since there had apparently been several more instances of kids nearly being lost during games of hide and seek. Enjolras, only half-jokingly, had suggested that they should probably ban hide and seek.

Thanks to the hot weather they could have another movie night and a bonfire, but the end of their third week greeted them with a thunderstorm and another few days of rain. It did stop long enough for the kids to have a very muddy football game out in the field and somehow everyone, even the people who’d just watched and cheered for them, ended up splattered with mud.

Enjolras seemed to be in a really glum mood all the while until the weather was starting to get better and their plans for the last week of camp weren’t in danger of falling through anymore.

* * *

“Some of the kids are really talented, aren’t they?” Enjolras mused as he gathered the paintings that the kids had left behind. They’d dragged off Feuilly to the lake, so Enjolras was helping Grantaire pack up the arts and crafts supplies.

Grantaire hummed. One of the girls had started drawing a comic that she was trying to finish this week before she had to go back home. Grantaire really admired her dedication.

“You know, one of them told me that he wants to become an artist,” Enjolras went on. “Like you.”

“Poor kid,” Grantaire mumbled. “I hope he changes his mind.”

Enjolras frowned. “Why?”

“Because being like me is really nothing anyone should aspire to,” Grantaire said dryly.

Enjolras’ frown only deepened. “What are you talking about? You’re talented. That one piece of yours is still in the main building’s entrance hall. Everyone knows you.”

“Not _everyone_ knows me.” Grantaire rolled his eyes, because this was just Enjolras believing in all the good things in the world, which, in Grantaire’s case, was a terrible idea. Because Grantaire didn’t do good things. Grantaire fucked up more than he achieved anything. “Seriously, being an artist sounds cool, but actually you’re just broke and looking for alternatives that will actually earn you some money.”

“I do hope you don’t talk to the kids like that.” Enjolras dumped a bunch of sharpies into one of the plastic boxes. “Because that would be–”

“No, of course not,” Grantaire interrupted. “I’m not telling them that the future is bleak and that everything is terrible. But, honestly, telling them that they should become artists is just stupid.”

“Oh, you think encouraging them is stupid?”

Grantaire groaned. “Dude, you’re going to be some fancy lawyer and chances are that you won’t have to worry about whether or not you’ll find a job or if you’ll be able to pay your bills. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Enjolras slowly put down the crayons he’d been gathering and gave Grantaire a cold look. “I think you’ve got it from here.”

“Oh, come on,” Grantaire said, “what’s your problem?”

“What’s my problem? Are you serious?” Enjolras huffed and quickly looked around. When he saw that there was no one around, he turned back to Grantaire. “Your attitude is my problem,” he hissed and stomped off towards the main building.

Grantaire only rolled his eyes and gathered up the crayons again. At least he got to go home soon.  


	6. Chapter 6

“Why is Enjolras staring at you like he wants to stab you in the gut?” Bossuet asked lowly.

Joly made a choking noise. “Ew, come on.”

“You’re pre-med,” Bossuet said matter-of-factly. “People being stabbed should excite you.”

“Can we stop talking about stabbings,” Joly said flatly.

“Yeah, let’s talk about this piece of toast,” Grantaire muttered and pushed at his plate. “It’s a very nice piece of toast.”

“No, but seriously,” Joly whispered and leaned closer to Grantaire, “did you and Enjolras get into a fight?”

Grantaire shrugged and picked up his toast. “It’s nothing.” He glanced over at Enjolras who was talking to Combeferre, smiling about something. “He’s just annoyed with me, nothing new there.”

“He’ll get over it,” Bossuet said and gave Grantaire a nudge. “He always does.”

“I know,” Grantaire grumbled. It was just that he’d liked the smiling and the small-talk and he really missed Enjolras smiling at him over his cup of coffee during breakfast. Which was bad, because by now he should definitely be very much over Enjolras in every possible way.

Enjolras didn’t talk to him all morning, only quickly spoke to Feuilly before they went to set up the arts and crafts table. Grantaire didn’t miss that Enjolras stayed very, very far away from their table all day.

He did glare at Grantaire in passing every now and again, which was somehow even worse than one of their arguments. Grantaire could handle the arguments. The arguments were loud and they just got it all out and afterwards they could still sit down at the same table and ignore that they’d yelled at each other twenty minutes earlier. It was what they did and it had always worked for them.

But this, the silence, the glaring, it was unsettling. Even more unsettling than Enjolras trying to be nice to him because they were at work. Grantaire was pretty sure that that was the reason why Enjolras wasn’t yelling. He didn’t want the kids to notice that they weren’t getting along, that there was any kind of problem, so Enjolras stayed away and hated him quietly.

Grantaire did want to get this out of the way, but Enjolras quite obviously didn’t want to talk to him, so maybe it was for the best if he just let him sulk. Because Grantaire was pretty sure that that was Enjolras was doing. Sulking. Because Grantaire didn’t see a bright future for himself and had chosen a more realistic approach for his life.

Not that Grantaire thought that encouraging the kids was a bad idea in general. Grantaire just knew that outside of this camp he was no one a kid should look up to. And Enjolras should know that, too. Honestly, Grantaire was sure that Enjolras would usually be the first one to agree that he wasn’t the most reliable of people. Enjolras thought he was a pain in the ass.

For most of the day, Grantaire managed to ignore that Enjolras was glaring daggers at him from across the field. He didn’t have lunch and dinner at the counselors’ table and Enjolras didn’t seem to have any announcements at the end of the day.

Grantaire had hot chocolate on the front steps with Jehan and Courfeyrac, who both seemed to have noticed that something was off but obviously didn’t want to pry. They just kept shooting him looks that were somewhere between curious and concerned. At least they weren’t glaring.

The easiest thing – and Grantaire knew that full well – would be for him to apologize to Enjolras. But since Grantaire didn’t actually feel like he’d done anything wrong and Enjolras was the one who’d got all snappy, this was _so_ not going to happen, even though it would probably make the last week of camp a lot more enjoyable for the both of them.

So when Grantaire walked back to their cabin with Courfeyrac and Jehan and Enjolras came walking towards them, probably on his way back from checking on the kids, Grantaire kept his eyes on the ground and quickly walked past him without wishing him a good night.

* * *

“Okay, listen...” Courfeyrac ripped open another bag of water balloons. “I’ve been thinking... about the thing.”

Grantaire looked up. “The thing?” He wasn’t quite sure what thing Courfeyrac was talking about. There were too many _things_ in their lives that were confusing and needed to be thought about.

“About Combeferre,” Courfeyrac whispered conspirationally. “I should ask him out. And I’ve been thinking that I could ask him to come to the party with me.”

“The party,” Grantaire echoed. “A specific party?”

“Right, you wouldn’t know about this. Well, there’s this big party for all the volunteers, Valjean buys us tons of food and we bring our own drinks and it’s great, it’s never not been a great party. And I think I should ask him. You know, to be my date for the party,” Courfeyrac said. “What do you think?”

“You should do that, yeah,” Grantaire mumbled, a little distracted by Enjolras, who was over by the lake filling up all water guns for the big water war later on.

“Stop checking out Enjolras for a minute,” Courfeyrac said and chucked one of the still empty balloons at him. “You know, I’d talk to him about this, but he and Combeferre are always in the same place these days.”

“Well,” Grantaire said and turned to look at Courfeyrac, “as I said, you should do that.”

“So you think he’ll say yes? Because you love me and you wouldn’t tell me to do it if you thought he’d say no, right?”

Grantaire was one hundred percent sure that Combeferre was going to say yes, there was really no doubt about it. “Pretty sure he will, yeah.”

“Pretty sure,” Courfeyrac said, nodding, “that’s good. That’s... yeah, I can work with that.”

“Obviously,” Grantaire said. “At this point everyone knows already anyway. I’m pretty sure that even the kids have noticed. They’re kids, but a lot of them are super smart kids.”

Courfeyrac rolled his eyes. “Please. It’s just a bit of innocent flirting. Very innocent. No one noticed.”

“I noticed,” Grantaire said. “More importantly, Combeferre noticed.”

Courfeyrac smiled sheepishly. “You know, when I sat next to him during movie night, he put his arm around me.” He sighed. “He always does that when we watch a movie, but still.”

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “Subtle.”

“Well, it is actually very subtle. Because I have no idea what it means. Did he do it because he always does it or did he do it because he wants to make out with me?”

“You’re fucking ridiculous,” Grantaire mumbled. “And don’t you dare say _language_. You are, so this was appropriate.” He splashed some water in Courfeyrac’s face. “And he probably wants to make out with you.”

“God, I hope so.” Courfeyrac laughed and handed Grantaire another water balloon. “I really need to stop thinking about making out with Combeferre, because we’re totally behind on the water balloons.”

“Yeah, how do you get anything done?”

Courfeyrac sighed deeply and filled up another balloon without a comment. They actually managed to fill all the balloons by three in the afternoon and Cosette went to hand them out to the kids, while Marius and Combeferre handed out water guns. Grantaire was going to be filling up spare water guns with Joly over by the lake for now, so the kids could get new ones and didn’t have to wait for too long.

Enjolras was explaining the rules, as few as there were, declared that the game would be over once everyone was drenched and then sent them all to their positions. He looked at Grantaire, only briefly, and he wasn’t smiling, but he also wasn’t glaring, so maybe Grantaire should count that as an achievement.

He didn’t see much of the kids ducking behind trees and the obstacles that the counselors had put up, because he was too busy with the water guns until Bahorel came running over and handed Grantaire his water gun.

“Go make me proud,” Bahorel said and gave Grantaire a pat on the back that almost sent him flying right into the lake.

Grantaire frowned down at the water gun. “And what now?”

“Now you run,” Joly said. “Seriously, they’ll get you eventually, just run.”

“Okay,” Grantaire mumbled and started running and was immediately hit by two water balloons, another one soared right past his head before he ducked behind a tipped over table. He did his best to get as many people as possible with his water gun before he eventually ran out of water.

Just when he wanted to run back over to the lake to refill his water gun, Enjolras dove behind the table as well, dropping halfway onto Grantaire’s lap. He quickly slid off him with a huff, sparing Grantaire an unreadable glance.

“Someone’s enthusiastic,” Grantaire said dryly.

Enjolras only huffed again and then slapped a water balloon on Grantaire’s head. “At least I’m participating,” he said and then he was off again.

Grantaire sighed and followed him. He was drenched within a minute and he had a feeling that Enjolras – or maybe Bossuet, because he was smiling extra brightly when Grantaire ran past him – might have promised some of the kids an extra cookie if they chased him and no one else.

Eventually, when all the water balloons were gone and everyone was drenched – Grantaire was pretty sure that his white shirt had gone see-through, much like Combeferre’s, whom Courfeyrac was not-so-inconspicuously stealing glances at – most of them ended up getting chased into the lake by the kids. Grantaire was glad that he, much like everyone else, had decided to just wear his swimming trunks for the game.

Joly and Bossuet took their places on the lifeguard chair again, today joined by Combeferre who kept a look out by the dock, since so many kids were in the lake after the water war. Grantaire, in the meantime, helped everyone else pick up what was left of the water balloons. He was actually glad for his soaked shirt, because the heat was almost unbearable today.

They’d decided that they wouldn’t put up the activity tables after the water war, mainly because it was so hot that the kids would spend most of their time in and around the lake anyway.

Grantaire, for one, was happy about the afternoon off and eventually let Feuilly and Bahorel drag him over to the slide.

* * *

Everyone was starting to get antsy towards the end of the last week, the kids were starting to act up, which Grantaire though they could probably blame on the hot weather. Not that the kids were little well-behaved angels all the time, but usually their bickering died down pretty quickly.

Only today, there were a lot of stolen crayons and ruined paintings and at some point Louise started crying because Emily had stolen one of the red colored pencils from her and Feuilly spent the following five minutes explaining to her that she needed to apologize when she upset someone. Which got Grantaire thinking that maybe he should apologize to Enjolras after all.

Enjolras had stopped glaring at him altogether, but he still didn’t talk to Grantaire unless he had to. Things were still pretty awkward and Grantaire was also pretty sure that the entire staff had noticed by now.

Emily and Louise were now making friendship bracelets for each other and Grantaire eventually joined them. He wasn’t seriously considering giving Enjolras a friendship bracelet, but it was distracting him sufficiently and he was sincerely hoping that he’d come up with a better way of apologizing.

But Grantaire wasn’t very good at apologies, so when he still hadn’t come up with anything remotely reasonable in the evening, he put the bracelet in his pocket and went to find Enjolras after they’d sent the kids to bed. There was no point in trying to talk to him beforehand. Grantaire found him sitting on the steps in front of the main building with Combeferre, who quickly excused himself and said he had to check something in the administration cabin.

“Is something wrong?” Enjolras asked, not quite looking Grantaire in the eye.

“No, I just wanted to give you this,” Grantaire said and pulled the friendship bracelet he’d made out of his pocket. “You don’t have to wear it or anything, it’s just... a peace offering, I guess. I’m sorry about the other day.”

Enjolras was looking at him now, steady, eyes piercing, and Grantaire wanted to walk away more than anything, but then Enjolras held up his left arm. “Don’t be ridiculous, of course I’m going to wear it.”

Honestly, it hadn’t been _that_ ridiculous of him to think that Enjolras might not want it, but Grantaire decided not to mention it and sat down next to Enjolras to tie the bracelet around his arm. There were others, many others – Grantaire recognized one of them as Courfeyrac’s work, since he was wearing one that looked almost the same.

“Thank you,” Enjolras said. He still sounded guarded, but at least he was talking to him. “I suppose I should apologize as well.”

Grantaire hummed, because it was really up to Enjolras. He was just trying to make this less awkward. And maybe he’d got so used to getting along well with Enjolras that he hadn’t actually wanted it to stop. As much fun as he always had riling Enjolras up, the smiles and the joking had been so much better.

“I just don’t like it when you talk about yourself like you’ve accomplished nothing in your life,” Enjolras said lowly, “or that you’re not going to get anywhere with your art. And that lawyer comment...” He trailed off and huffed. “I don’t suppose I have to explain to you why exactly I wasn’t too intrigued by that.”

“Nah, I get it,” Grantaire said. “I don’t get why you think that I’ll ever–”

“I’m your friend, that’s what friends do. And I’ve seen your art, even if we weren’t friends, I could see how talented you are.”

“Yeah, but talent–”

“Will you just let me believe that you’re very good at what you do,” Enjolras interrupted. “Is it so hard for you not to fight with me about every little thing? At Courfeyrac’s party–”

Maybe now was a good time for Grantaire to fuck the hell off. “Enjolras...”

“At Courfeyrac’s party,” Enjolras repeated insistently, “you said you liked me. And I thought liking someone meant that you don’t act like you’re their sworn nemesis.”

Grantaire let out the breath he’d been holding ever since the words _at Courfeyrac’s party_ had left Enjolras’ mouth. It seemed that Courfeyrac had been right, though. Enjolras thought that it had been, well, more of a friendship confession. “Yeah, I guess not.”

“I know we’re not... well, we see a lot of things differently,” Enjolras said. “But I don’t see why we can’t be friends.”

“We already are friends, Enjolras.”

“I know, but we never meet up like we do with our other friends,” Enjolras said with a shrug. “We could meet up for lunch sometime. Talk about things.”

Grantaire frowned. “What things?”

“I don’t know, things you talk about with your friends.”

“Well, if you want to...” Grantaire had no idea if there was anything at all that he could say to Enjolras that wouldn’t end with them fighting, but then he remembered the evening of the night hike, how they’d talked, and even though Grantaire knew it wasn’t the best idea to spend even more time with Enjolras, he said, “Fine, let’s do that sometime.”

Chances were that Enjolras would be too busy with his classes to meet up with him anyway.

Enjolras smiled at him. “Good. By the way, do want to drive back into town with me on Sunday evening?”

Grantaire hadn’t even thought about how he was going to get back to Paris, even though camp was over just a couple of days from now. He was nervous about going back home, mainly because he felt like he’d existed in some sort of vacuum for the past few weeks – he’d slept well, the kids had kept him busy and, sure, it hadn’t always been the easiest of jobs, but he hadn’t lain awake at night for hours and he hadn’t spent hours sitting at the Corinthe’s bar, wondering what he was doing. And that was what he was going to go back to once he left this happy colorful bubble full of cookies and camp fires and tie-dye shirts.

He sighed. “Yeah, I guess... yeah, sure, if you’ve got enough space for me.”

“There won’t be that much stuff in my car this time,” Enjolras said, “so I’m sure that it’ll be fine.”

“That’s good, because I’m bringing about a gazillion pictures I got from the kids.”

Enjolras nodded and smiled, his fingers trailing along the friendship bracelet that Grantaire had just tied around his wrist.

Grantaire wouldn’t have minded sitting outside the main building with Enjolras for a little while longer, but he eventually had to leave to check if the kids had all turned off their lights. Grantaire went back to his cabin, where Courfeyrac immediately pulled him onto his bed. “What the hell,” Grantaire said, shooting Jehan a confused look.

Jehan, who was also perched on Courfeyrac’s bed, only shrugged.

“He beat me to it,” Courfeyrac said gravely. And it seemed like Courfeyrac thought that Grantaire and Jehan knew what he was talking about, but all that Grantaire managed to do was stare blankly, since he had no idea what Courfeyrac was on about.

“ _He_ beat you to _it_?” Jehan eventually said. “Care to elaborate?”

“Yeah, remember what I told you about? The thing I was going to do, like, what I was going to ask Combeferre?” He looked at both of them expectantly, smiling when they both realized what this was about. “Yeah, he asked me first. He wants to go to the party with me.”

“Aw, I’m so happy,” Jehan said and threw his arms around Courfeyrac.

“He was so embarrassed and he was smiling and I just wanted to smooch his face,” Courfeyrac said. “I also might have said that out loud while I was talking to him, so we were both embarrassed, it was great.”

“Well done,” Grantaire said and patted his head. Maybe he was actually a little jealous. Two people liking each other and actually telling each other exactly that without any major issues seemed positively utopian. Grantaire was pretty sure that it was never going to be that easy for him.

Courfeyrac sighed happily. “Do you think he’ll make out with me behind the counselor’s cabin? I’ve always wanted to do that. You know, when my parents sent me to camp, I always thought I would get it on with people there, but it never happened, because I wasn’t a cool kid and Enjolras refused to make out with me.” He paused, biting his lip. “I’m oversharing, aren’t I?”

“It’s fine,” Jehan said. “And maybe you should ask nicely. I’m sure Combeferre wouldn’t mind, especially on Sunday evening after all the kids have gone.”

“Sunday evening,” Courfeyrac echoed, nodding, “yeah.” He gave Grantaire a nudge. “You really need to step up your game.”

“My game?” Grantaire asked.

“You should start by talking to Enjolras again.”

“Oh, he was talking to Enjolras just now,” Jehan said. “I saw you guys in front of the main building. Did you make up?”

“We... no, I mean, maybe. It’s not like we were fighting, it was just a thing.”

Courfeyrac raised his eyebrows. “A thing?”

“Yeah, you know one of those things where we argue about something stupid and blow it completely out of proportion?”

“Ah,” Jehan said knowingly, “one of _those_ things.”

“Well, we figured it must be something like that,” Courfeyrac said with a shrug. “Hey, I have an idea. You should ask Enjolras to go to the party with you.”

“Yeah, no, absolutely not.” Enjolras had just told him that he wanted to try to be friends with him and Grantaire making another attempt at telling him that he actually liked him a little more than a friend probably wasn’t the best idea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who left a comment on last week's chapter, I'm sorry, I didn't have time to reply!


	7. Chapter 7

Grantaire walked down the gravelly path, back to his cabin, waving at Musichetta as he passed her. Everyone was still sitting outside, chatting and eating leftover snacks from the big bonfire they’d had for their last night of camp. Some of the kids who’d done dance workshops with Courfeyrac had even put on a little show for them.

It had got pretty late and the counselors had ushered the kids back to their cabins a while ago, but nobody seemed to mind that the lights were still on in all of them.

Grantaire had just quickly checked on David, because he’d had to take him to the nurse earlier. He had turned out to be suffering from a severe case of too much ice cream, chocolate and marshmallows and he’d promised Grantaire that he was feeling better already.

A little lost in thought, Grantaire nearly bumped into Enjolras, who’d just walked out of his group’s cabin. “Sorry, I wasn’t looking,” Grantaire mumbled.

“That’s alright.” Enjolras frowned. “Where did you just come from?”

“Oh, I just checked on one of the kids,” Grantaire said with a shrug. “He wasn’t feeling well earlier, but he’s fine now.”

Enjolras looked at him for a moment before he started heading towards the counselors’ cabin. “That was nice of you.”

Grantaire didn’t really think that it was a big deal, so he only hummed. “I guess.”

“Ready for the last day?”

Grantaire laughed. “Definitely.” Then again, he really wasn’t. He would have loved to stay here a little longer, maybe not as an activity leader, just to hang out with his friends.

“It’s not an easy job, especially when you’re doing it for the first time,” Enjolras said. “But see it this way, next year you’ll already be used to it.”

“Next year?”

Enjolras nodded. “Well, it’s obviously up to you,” he said quickly, “but I’m sure that Valjean will ask you to come back.”

“Oh,” Grantaire only said. He hadn’t thought much about it, because he’d been a last minute addition to the team. He’d been pretty sure that this had been a one-time offer, but it seemed that he’d been dead wrong about that.

“The kids like you.” Enjolras stopped in front of the counselors’ cabin and Grantaire only now realized that he’d walked past his own. “And before you say something like, _don’t sound so surprised_... I’m not surprised. I’ve seen you with Gavroche and his friends, I know that you’re good with kids. We wouldn’t have asked you to join us otherwise.”

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “We? Courfeyrac asked me, you know.”

“I know. I’m the only who suggested it to him,” Enjolras said lowly, “but I was sure you’d say no if I asked you, because you always do the opposite of what I want you to do.” He smiled and walked up the steps to his cabin. “Sleep well, Grantaire.”

“Yeah, you too,” Grantaire muttered, not sure if he’d ever be able to wrap his head around the fact that Enjolras had actually wanted him here.

When Grantaire stepped into his cabin a moment later, he found himself right in the middle of a pillow fight. Instead of just walking straight back outside, Grantaire picked up his pillow and joined Feuilly in burying a laughing Jehan under a pile of pillows.

They eventually all tumbled into bed, except for Courfeyrac, who was probably still hanging out with Combeferre. He came sneaking into the cabin a long while after they’d turned off their lights – Grantaire still noticed because his brain apparently didn’t want him to go to sleep that night.  

His mind kept wandering back to his tiny apartment in Paris and he couldn’t help but wonder what he was going to do once he was home again. Maybe he should have found himself a job for after he was back from camp, or maybe he could just work on some of his projects and actually finish something for once.

It wasn’t like he hadn’t felt bad for a single second in those four weeks, it wasn’t like hadn’t thought of having a smoke or a drink more than was probably healthy, but he’d been distracted enough to sufficiently ignore it. He’d convinced himself to get up every single day and he’d slept extraordinarily well. Unlike tonight, where he kept drifting in and out of sleep. He woke up when Feuilly snored, when Bahorel turned over on his bed and the springs creaked, when Jehan mumbled something in his sleep.

Grantaire was already awake when the first rays of sunlight shone in through the window above Courfeyrac’s bed. Eventually, when Grantaire was tired of tossing and turning, he slipped out of bed, pulled on a pair of shorts and decided to go on a walk around the grounds.

Everything was quiet when Grantaire slipped outside. Enjolras wasn’t up and doing yoga next to the counselors’ cabin, the kitchen staff hadn’t got up to prepare breakfast yet. Grantaire strolled across the field, the grass now brown and patchy after four weeks of games and gatherings.

Grantaire stopped dead when he saw Enjolras sitting on the dock, his feet dangling into the water. He really shouldn’t be surprised that Enjolras was up after all. Grantaire slowly walked up to him, smiling when Enjolras looked over his shoulder.

“It’s true,” Grantaire said as he sat down next to Enjolras, “you really never sleep.”

Enjolras smirked. “And you have finally taken my advice.”

“Your advice?”

“I told you it’s nice to watch the sun come up in the morning.”

“The sun _is_ up.”

“Not quite,” Enjolras said, “it’s still early.”

Grantaire snorted. “Hell yeah, it is. How long have you been sitting here anyway?”

Enjolras looked a lot like he wanted to make another one of those _language_ comments, but eventually just shrugged. “A while.”

“So you don’t sleep.”

“I did, but...” Enjolras trailed off, water splashing when he wiggled his toes. “There’s a lot of stuff I need to take care of today. I have a list, but I woke up at four and kept wondering if I maybe forgot about something, so I thought I might as well get up.” Enjolras turned to look at him. “What about you? I thought you always sleep as long as you possibly can.”

“Yeah, that’s usually what I do,” Grantaire muttered.

Enjolras frowned, probably because Grantaire technically hadn’t answered his question. He didn’t pry, though. “Well, I’ll certainly do that tomorrow. Sleep in, I mean. I was going to meet up with Valjean tomorrow to talk about the problems we ran into, but he suggested I take a day off.”

“You definitely deserve it,” Grantaire said. Everyone had worked hard, there was no doubt about that, but Enjolras had certainly been the one who’d been the busiest and the most hard-working of them all. “I didn’t realize we ran into problems.”

“It wasn’t anything too bad. Just a few minor hiccoughs, really. And maybe I can convince Valjean to get us some instruments for next year. A couple of guitars maybe.”

“I’m sure the kids would like that.”

Enjolras hummed. “So, did you have a good time?”

“I did, yeah,” Grantaire replied. The only major fault of this job really was that it was unpaid. And spending four weeks with Enjolras hadn’t been as terrible as Grantaire had first expected.

“I’m glad,” Enjolras said, smiling at him.

Grantaire made an attempt at smiling back at him, but then quickly averted his gaze and took off his shoes so he could dip his feet into the water. Yeah, he still wasn’t quite sure how to deal with the smiling.

They sat in silence for a while, Enjolras splashing water on Grantaire’s legs every now and then. Enjolras seemed restless – he always was, but that was because he was busy. Today he seemed nervous. He’d handled everything so well, Grantaire had no idea what he was so worried about.

“You okay?” Grantaire eventually asked.

“I’m fine,” Enjolras said quickly. He sighed. “Well,” he continued, “there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you.”

Grantaire coughed. “Oh yeah?”

“Yes, well, or maybe _tell_ you.” Enjolras eyed him for a moment. “When I said we should hang out, you know, like friends do, I didn’t exactly mean... as friends. Or I did, because I’d like for us to be friends, but I might have had ulterior motives.”

“Ulterior motives?” Grantaire echoed.

“I...” Enjolras let out a frustrated sigh. “What I mean is, I do want to be friends, but I also want to be more than that.”

“More than that.”

“Will you stop repeating everything I say,” Enjolras said, rolling his eyes. “You know what I’m trying to say, don’t you?”

Well, vaguely, Grantaire did understand. But it sounded... well, it sounded too good to be true. “You want to be more than friends.”

“Yes,” Enjolras said. “I didn’t realize until that party at Courfeyrac’s. When you said you liked me? I thought you meant... more than a friend. But then you said it to everyone else, so obviously I was wrong about that. My point is, I was disappointed. Because I wanted you to...” He trailed off. “I hope I’m not making you uncomfortable.”

“You’re not,” Grantaire said. He just had no idea what to do or what to say. He was mildly confused.

“You _look_ uncomfortable,” Enjolras muttered. “I just really can’t tell how you feel about this, so it would be helpful if you could say something.”

It wasn’t like Grantaire didn’t want to say anything, there were many things he wanted to say, he wanted to ask Enjolras if he was serious, if he had any idea what he was getting into, if he’d thought long and hard about this – well, this was Enjolras, so the answer was probably yes. What came out in the end was, “I really want to kiss you right now.”

Enjolras looked surprised for a moment, opened his mouth to say something, but then he quickly looked over his shoulder with a frown. Grantaire followed his gaze and saw Musichetta and Louison walking towards the main building, the rest of the kitchen staff right behind them.

“I need to...” Enjolras pointed at the cabins. “I’m sorry.” He bit his lip and then leaned in to give Grantaire quick kiss, so quick that Grantaire had a hard time catching up on what was happening. Enjolras pulled away with a smile. “Let’s talk about this later, alright?”

“Yeah, later, great,” Grantaire said, watching as Enjolras walked away. He remained sitting at the lake for a few more minutes, trying to keep his thoughts from wandering in all kinds of different directions. Eventually he went to have a shower, smirking at Combeferre and Courfeyrac who were standing out on the front steps of the counselors’ cabin, making heart-eyes at each other.

During breakfast Enjolras sat down across from Grantaire, which wasn’t anything special, but he was smiling at him again and now Grantaire finally got what all that smiling had actually been about. Grantaire smiled back at him and he wasn’t quite sure whether or not Enjolras’ foot bumping against his under the table had been an accident.

After breakfast, Enjolras sent the kids off to pack, then he also sent everyone else off to pack, after Courfeyrac muttered something about having forgotten all about packing. Grantaire was glad, because so had he. Grantaire spent the better part of the morning gathering all the gifts he’d got from the kids, still not sure how to take them all home until Feuilly presented him with a massive cardboard box.

A lot of the kids were picked up by their moms or dads after lunch, but Valjean had also organized a bus for the kids whose parents couldn’t make it. Once the kids were gone – after many hugs and goodbyes and even a few tears – Grantaire was left with even more presents. He also wasn’t quite sure what was going to happen next. He knew that they were going to pack everything up, but there actually wasn’t too much left to do.

“So, what now?” Grantaire asked.

“Now,” Courfeyrac said and threw himself onto the ground, arms and legs stretched out, “we are done.”

Bahorel joined him with a deep sigh. “It’s so quiet.”

“It’s heavenly,” Joly whispered and promptly made a pillow out of Bahorel.

“Now we relax,” Enjolras said, “then we finish packing.”

“We relax? Even you?”

“For about five minutes,” Enjolras allowed and sat down next to the others, waving Grantaire over to join them as well.

* * *

“Do you have everything?” Enjolras asked as he put Grantaire’s massive box into the back of his car.

Grantaire hummed in affirmation and his bag joined the box together with a bag full of leftover food.  They’d ordered pizza for everyone, so the kitchen staff would have the evening off as well. “Do we need to take any of that other stuff?” They’d spent a lot of time packing up all the toys and supplies, which were now all stacked up neatly in the main building.

“Someone with a _really_ big car is going to pick those up tomorrow.”

“Okay, so...” Grantaire buried his hands in the pockets of his shorts, looking around the empty grounds. They were the last ones to leave, because Enjolras had wanted to take one last look at the cabins to make sure that all the lights were off and that no one had forgotten anything – they’d found two shirts, a hair brush, a couple of stray socks, and stuffed animals that would probably be missed dearly. “So, we’re leaving?”

“That was the plan,” Enjolras said and heaved his own bag into the car. “Unless...”

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “Unless?”

“Well, we could stay here for a little while longer. I mean, last year we didn’t leave until midnight, no one cares if we stick around for a bit.”

“Stick around,” Grantaire said, nodding.

“You’re doing that thing again,” Enjolras said, smiling at him. “Anyway, we could talk. We were talking earlier, before... well, we could...” He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, looking increasingly anxious.

Grantaire slammed the trunk shut with a grin. “Sure, yeah, let’s do that.”

“At the lake?” Enjolras asked and started walking before Grantaire could answer.

Grantaire tried his hardest to be cool about this. He was here, all alone with Enjolras, and Grantaire knew what Enjolras wanted to talk about, they could do that, they could talk, but Grantaire was slowly but surely starting to freak out about the whole thing. They’d kissed just this morning and Enjolras wanted to _talk_ and Grantaire was afraid that he was going to say something wrong and mess everything up.

“Maybe we should have brought snacks,” Grantaire said as he sat down at the end of the dock, mainly because he couldn’t think of anything better right now.

“Oh,” Enjolras said, already halfway to getting up again, “I could get some if you–”

“No, Enjolras...” Grantaire caught him by his shirt and pulled him back down. “I was kidding, it’s fine, sit down.”

“Okay, I’m sitting down.” Enjolras sighed. “I’m sorry, but I’ve never done this before. I mean, I’ve gone out on dates with people, but this isn’t the exact same thing. You’re not some stranger.”

“Yeah, well... we could still go out on a date.”

“We could,” Enjolras said. He smiled at Grantaire. “We should.”

“Good,” Grantaire said.

Enjolras nodded. “Yes, very good.”

“Yeah...” Grantaire took off his flip flops and let his feet dangle into the water again. “I kinda want to jump in.”

“You could,” Enjolras mumbled.

Grantaire shrugged. “Nah, it’s probably not the best idea.” He cleared his throat, looking around a little aimlessly. This really shouldn’t be so awkward. It was nice here by the lake, the sun was setting behind them and the first stars were starting to appear, and yet Grantaire was starting to think that he should have jumped into the lake after all because then he wouldn’t have to try so hard to find something to say.

“Grantaire,” Enjolras said eventually, reaching out, but apparently changing his mind halfway. He dropped his hand in his lap.

“Yeah?”

“We could give kissing another try if you want. Because we’ve established that we’re going to go out on a date, which I think is a great idea and... and I sound like I’m conducting business deal.” Enjolras laughed. “That was weird. I should have listened to Courfeyrac.”

“I don’t know what Courfeyrac told you, but chances are that it was a good idea not to listen to him.” Grantaire bit his lip. “But yeah, we can do that.”

“Okay,” Enjolras said and leaned a little closer, “I’ll just...”

“Yeah, go for it.” Grantaire snorted when Enjolras made an attempt at giving him a kiss, but missed his lips and kissed the corner of his mouth instead. “We’ll get there.”

“Hopefully,” Enjolras said and kissed him again, this time with a little more precision. And Grantaire could really get used to this. Maybe he shouldn’t, because he had no idea how this was going to work out in the long run, but he didn’t even want to think about the future right now.

He was enjoying this and he enjoyed the noise that Enjolras made when Grantaire pulled him closer. This was going well enough, although at some point Enjolras twitched and whacked at his arm.

Grantaire laughed. “What was that?”

“Mosquito,” Enjolras muttered. He turned around. “It got really dark.”

“Yeah, that happens, you know, when it gets late,” Grantaire whispered, groaning when Enjolras elbowed him in the ribs. “Well, we can always go home.”

“In a bit,” Enjolras said and leaned against Grantaire. “You never really see the stars that well back home.”

Grantaire nodded. “It’s nice out here.”

“We can leave whenever you want, though,” Enjolras said quietly. “Just say the word.”

Grantaire put his arm around Enjolras. “No, I’m good.”

* * *

“I’m sorry, by the way.”

“What?” Grantaire asked. They were on their way home and he’d zoned out a bit. Not just a bit, actually. He’d been going over and over about this thing with him and Enjolras and how it had happened all of a sudden. Except that it hadn’t been that sudden, Grantaire just hadn’t been paying attention.

“I’m sorry,” Enjolras said again. “When I said those things about your attitude and all that. I don’t think I apologized, or not really, at least. I might have blown things out of proportion.”

“Oh, it’s... it’s okay.”

“I’ll try not to yell as much in the future.”

“If I remember correctly, you weren’t yelling,” Grantaire said lowly.

“Well, Combeferre thinks I yell too much. I asked him, about what he thought I could do differently and he mentioned that. So, I’m sorry.”

“It’s weird that you’re apologizing. You usually don’t do that.”

“You better get used to it, because I will definitely be doing that in the future,” Enjolras said, briefly glancing over at him.

Grantaire laughed. “I guess I can live with that.”

“Alright,” Enjolras said, looking smug now. He reached out to take Grantaire’s hand. “Is it okay if I do that?”

“Yeah, you have permission to do that whenever you want.”

“Good to know.”

Much to Grantaire’s disappointment, Enjolras had to let go of his hand once they got back into the city. Since it was late and the streets were fairly empty, it didn’t take them too long to get to Grantaire’s apartment. Enjolras insisted on helping Grantaire carry his box upstairs, hovering in the doorway while Grantaire looked around. Everything in his apartment was dusty, and it was stuffy, much like no one had opened the window in a month – which was coincidentally exactly what had happened. Or, well, _not_ happened.

“Thanks for your help,” Grantaire said. He played with the thought of offering Enjolras a cup of coffee, but he looked like he was about to fall asleep right there in the doorway, so Grantaire really shouldn’t keep him. “Well, I’ll see you around?”

“I’ll call you,” Enjolras said. “Tomorrow.”

“Yeah, but promise you’ll sleep in.”

“I’ll try my best.”

“Okay,” Grantaire said and took a deep breath. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, Grantaire.” Enjolras gave him a kiss on the cheek. “By the way, do you want to go to the party with me? The one for the volunteers?”

Grantaire smiled. “I’d love to.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading and for leaving comments and kudos :)


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